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2019-01-12 Africa Subsaharan
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12 civilians killed in jihadist attack in Burkina Faso
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[PULSE.NG] Twelve non-combatants were killed on Thursday during a jihadist attack in the north of Burkina Faso
...The country in west Africa that they put where Upper Volta used to be. Its capital is Oogadooga, or something like that. Its president is currently Blaise Compaoré, who took office in 1987 and will leave office feet first, one way or the other...
, which has been battling a wave of Islamist violence, officials said Friday.
Burkina Faso has declared a state of emergency in several provinces and replaced its army chief this week as it struggles to put a stop to a spate of jihadist attacks
The west African country declared a state of emergency in several provinces at the end of last year and on Thursday replaced its army chief as it struggled to put a stop to a spate of such attacks.
In the latest violence, button men attacked a village market in broad daylight, the security ministry said in a statement issued late Friday.
"Around 30 armed individuals perpetrated... a terrorist attack in the village of Gasseliki," it said, giving a toll of 12 dead and two maimed.
"A barn, a cart and six shops were also set alight," it added.
A local source told AFP that the attackers "ransacked stores and opened fire on people who had gathered for the weekly market".
Jihadist attacks began in northern Burkina Faso in 2015 but then spread to the east, near the border with Togo and Benin.
The country is part of the vast Sahel region
... North Africa's answer to the Pak tribal areas...
and one of the poorest states in the world.
The region turned into a hotbed of violent extremism and lawlessness after chaos engulfed Libya in 2011, which was followed by an Islamist insurgency in northern Mali and the rise of Boko Haram
 ... not to be confused with Procol Harum, Harum Scarum, possibly to be confused with Helter Skelter. The Nigerian version of al-Qaeda and the Taliban rolled together and flavored with a smigeon of distinctly Subsaharan ignorance and brutality...
in northern Nigeria.
Most attacks in Burkina Faso itself have been attributed to the jihadist group Ansarul Islam, which emerged near the Mali border in December 2016, and to the JNIM (the Group to Support Islam and Moslems),
| ...Mali's most prominent jihadi group, Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Moslemin (JNIM). JNIM is an umbrella organization of regional terrorist groups including al-Qaeda in the Maghreb (AQIM) Sahara Emirate, al-Mourabitoun, and local groups Macina Liberation Front (MLF) and Ansar al-Din (AAD)... |
which has sworn allegiance to al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.
Ansarul Islam emerged as violence spilled over from Mali, where radical Islamists seized key Sahara towns in 2012 before being ousted by French troops.
Smaller groups are also active, with the overall number of fighters estimated to be in the hundreds, according to security sources.
The groups are believed to be responsible for more than 270 deaths since 2015. The capital Ouagadougou has been hit three times and almost 60 people have died there.
The jihadists extend their hold gradually, forcing government workers and others who oppose them to flee. The violence has so far displaced some 40,000 people.
In the north, gangs move freely through the country's mostly non-existent borders.
The jihadists mainly target the security forces, but also attack government officials and local chiefs who oppose them.
Teachers are vulnerable due to the jihadists' fierce opposition to secular, French education, with their threats and attacks sparking the closure of hundreds of schools in the north and the east.
As the country struggles to get on top of the violence, army chief Major General Oumarou Sadou was replaced on Thursday by General Moise Minoungou, according to a presidential decree read on public television.
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Posted by Fred 2019-01-12 00:00||
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File under: al-Qaeda in North Africa
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