Steph Deschamps / June 6, 2021
Northern Burkina Faso was hit on Friday night by two attacks, one of which killed at least 138 people, the deadliest in the country since jihadist violence began in 2015, with the U.N. Secretary General saying he was outraged.
The attacks occurred in the so-called three borders area between Burkina, Mali, and Niger, which is regularly targeted by deadly assaults on civilians and military personnel by suspected jihadists linked to al-Qaeda and the Islamic State.
On Friday night, armed individuals carried out a deadly raid in Solhan, in the province of Yagha.The death toll, still provisional, is about a hundred people killed, men and women, a security source told AFP.
Several injured people died of their wounds and new bodies were found.The death toll is still provisional at 138, said a local politician on Saturday evening, adding that the bodies have been buried in mass graves. According to this elected official, there are several dozen injured.
The victims are civilians of all ages, killed by the terrorists, the government said in a statement, adding that several houses and the market (of Solhan) were burned.
Faced with this tragedy of the dark forces, a national mourning of 72 hours, from today, June 5 at 00:00 to Monday, June 7 at 23:59, is decreed, adds the government, which states that the defense and security forces are working to neutralize these terrorists and restore peace among the people.
The President of Burkina Faso, Roch Marc Christian Kaboré, denounced this barbaric and despicable attack, calling for unity and solidarity against these obscurantist forces.
According to a local source, the attack, which was reported at around 2:00 a.m. (local and GMT), first targeted the post of the Volunteers for the Defense of the Fatherland, and the attackers then visited the concessions (houses) and carried out executions.
This massive attack followed closely on the heels of another late Friday night attack on a village in the same region, Tadaryat, in which at least 14 people were killed.
These attacks come a week after two other attacks in the same area killed four people.
On May 17 and 18, fifteen villagers and one soldier were killed in two assaults on a village and a patrol in the northeast.
Security forces are struggling to stem the spiral of jihadist violence that has left more than 1,400 people dead and more than a million displaced since 2015, fleeing the violence zones.