Ouagadougou – Nine soldiers were killed in an attack on a military detachment in jihadist-hit northern Burkina Faso on Monday, security sources said.
“Armed individuals attacked the military detachment of Yirgou” in the Barsalogho department around 0500 GMT on Monday, the security source told AFP, giving a provisional death toll of nine soldiers.
Another security source confirmed the toll, adding that five people were injured in the attack and “evacuated” for treatment.
That source added that there was also an “enormous” amount of equipment lost, with some burnt and “others taken away by the attackers”.
A government source, also speaking on condition of anonymity, said that search operations were under way “with reinforcements deployed in the area”.
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Burkina Faso has been plagued by regular, deadly jihadist attacks since 2015, mostly in the northern and eastern regions close to the Mali and Niger borders.
But on Saturday it was the south that was hit, with two soldiers killed by a makeshift bomb in Larabin near the Ivory Coast border.
Back in the north, five soldiers were killed during a reconnaissance mission in Mentao on Wednesday, also by a makeshift bomb, the armed forces said.
Such attacks, normally blamed on jihadists groups affiliated to the Islamic State or Al-Qaeda, have killed around 2,000 people and forced more than 1.4 million to flee their homes.
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Source: AFP
Picture: Getty Images
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