![The army said it had launched a large air and ground operation in response to the attack [File: Joe Penney/Reuters]](https://www.aljazeera.com/mritems/imagecache/mbdxxlarge/mritems/Images/2019/8/20/6211be247a0340d18c0b53163b20addc_18.jpg)
OUAGADOUGOU, Aug 21 (NNN-AGENCIES) — The death toll from an attack on a military base in northern Burkina Faso has risen to 24, the military
said, in the bloodiest assault in the army’s history.
Seven people are wounded and five are missing, armed forces headquarters
said in a statement on Tuesday.
The previous toll from the attack, at Koutougou in Soum province near the border with Mali, had been given as “more than a dozen”.
Monday’s attack came four days after suspected jihadists raided a village in the restive north, killing 15 people, plundering and burning shops.
A former French colony that ranks among one of the poorest countries in the world, Burkina Faso has been struggling with an Islamist revolt since 2015, which began in the north but has since spread to the east, near the border with Togo and Benin.
Most of the attacks have been attributed to the Ansarul Islam group, which emerged near the Mali border in December 2016, and to the Group to Support Islam and Muslims (GSIM), which has sworn allegiance to Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM).
Those groups are believed to have been responsible for around 500 deaths.
Burkina’s capital Ouagadougou has been attacked three times.
Previously, the heaviest Islamist attack against Burkina’s army left 12 soldiers dead at Nassoumbou, also in Soum province, in December 2016.
In March 2018, a jihadist attack on the military headquarters in Ouagadougou left eight dead.
Around 238,000 people have fled their homes, according to UN figures published on Aug 15.
France has deployed 4,500 troops in Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger and Chad in a mission codenamed Barkhane to help local forces flush out jihadists.
Burkina Faso has also joined four other Sahel nations (Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger) in a French-supported initiative aimed at creating a joint 5,000-troop anti-terror force.
Pres Roch Kabore said in a statement posted on the presidency website: “August 19th is a dark stain on the life of our national army. It is a heavy toll, which … saddens us.” — NNN-AGENCIES