BURKINA FASO, Dec 25 (NNN-AGENCIES) – An attack in Burkina Faso on Tuesday, killed 35 civilians, almost all of them women, in one of the deadliest assaults to hit the West African country in nearly five years.
Seven soldiers and 80 armed fighters were also killed, in the double attack on a military base and Arbinda town, in Soum province, in the country’s north.
Burkina Faso, bordering Mali and Niger, has been regularly targeted – hundreds have been killed, since the start of 2015, when violence began to spread across the Sahel region.
“A large group of terrorists simultaneously attacked military base and the civilian population in Arbinda,” the army chief of staff said, in a statement.
“The heroic action of our soldiers made it possible to neutralise 80 terrorists,” President Roch Marc Christian Kabore said. “This barbaric attack resulted in the death of 35 civilians, most of them women.”
Remis Dandjinou, communications minister and government spokesman, later said, 31 of the civilian victims were women.
“People, women for the most part, were trying to get water, and got murdered in cold blood by the terrorists while they were retreating. We must show compassion with the population, that is why all flags will fly at half mast for two days and all Christmas celebrations are cancelled.”
The president has declared 48 hours of national mourning.
The morning raid was carried out by dozens of fighters on motorbikes and lasted several hours before troops, backed by the air force, drove the attackers back.
No group claimed responsibility for the attack, but violence in Burkina Faso before has been blamed on fighters linked to al-Qaeda and Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).
“This is the worst attack ever, as far as I know, in Burkina Faso, which had its first terrorism attack only in 2015,” said William Lawrence, visiting professor of political science and international affairs, at George Washington University’s Elliott School. “Both their frequency and lethality have been increasing, but this is much much worse.– NNN-AGENCIES
