News Desk
OUAGADOUGOU: At least 28 people, including civilians and soldiers, have been killed in two attacks by armed assailants in Burkina Faso, a regional governor and the army said in separate statements.
The army said in a statement on Monday that a combat unit in Falagountou, in the country’s restive north bordering Niger, came under a militant attack and that 10 soldiers, two members of the volunteer force, and a civilian were killed.
Jean Charles dit Yenapono Some, governor of the Southern Cascades region near the border with Ivory Coast, said in a separate statement on Monday that the bodies of 15 men, all civilians, had been found following an attack on Sunday.
The governor said armed assailants had stopped two transport vehicles carrying eight women and 16 men. He added that the woman and the man were freed.
At least 10 civilians were killed in two other attacks in the town of Dassa in west-central Burkina Faso, almost 140km (90 miles) west of the capital Ouagadougou.
Officials say militants wreaking havoc
The latest violence comes as Burkina Faso and its neighbors in Mali and Niger battle armed groups linked to al-Qaeda and ISIL, who had occupied territory in the country’s arid and mainly rural north after executing hundreds of villagers and displacing nearly 2 million people.
The militants have also blockaded towns and villages, further aggravating a prevalent food crisis.
