The Eastern Maninka of Mali, numbering approximately 698,000 people, are Engaged yet Unreached. They are described as a Manding people of Upper Guinea and neighboring regions of West Africa, descended from the historic Mali Empire. They speak Eastern Maninka, a Mande language, and maintain cultural traditions shaped by farming, trade, and Islamic heritage They are an Diaspora people, with Maninka as their ethnic/kinship group and are in the Malinke people cluster of the Sub-Saharan African Peoples. They mostly adhere to Sunni Islam and Eastern Maninkakan is their primary language.