The fight against jihadists in the Sahel remains very complicated. Again on Monday evening, at least fifteen soldiers were killed during an attack by armed groups in northern Burkina Faso near the Mali border, we learned on Tuesday from security sources. “Yesterday evening the Tin-Akoff detachment was the target of a violent attack”, indicated a first security source, evoking a balance sheet of “fifteen dead” and “elements which are missing”.
A second security source interviewed by AFP confirmed this attack, putting forward a toll of 19 dead and “dozens of missing”. According to the first source, the air and ground response of the Burkinabè army made it possible to “neutralize” (kill, editor’s note) “dozens of terrorists”. “Operations are continuing on the ground and are concentrated in the province of Oudalan, at the level of the three borders (on the borders of Niger and Mali) which has experienced a resurgence of violence for a few days”, continued this source.
Spiral of jihadist violence
It is in this province that at least 51 soldiers were killed Friday in an ambush, a report which is still provisional, according to the army. This is the deadliest attack since Captain Ibrahim Traoré came to power, during a putsch at the end of September 2022.
The country, the scene of two military coups in 2022, has been caught since 2015 in a spiral of jihadist violence that appeared in Mali and Niger a few years earlier and which has spread beyond their borders. And the deadly raids attributed to jihadists have multiplied since the beginning of the year in Burkina Faso. In total, since 2015, the violence has left more than 10,000 dead – civilians and soldiers – according to NGOs, and some two million displaced.