The incident took place that morning near the village of Songobia, in central Mali, as their supply convoy was heading to its base in Sévaré.
El-Ghassim Wane, the head of MINUSMA, condemned the attack and offered his deepest condolences to the families and colleagues of the deceased peacekeepers.
On February 9, 2023, around 100 armed men drove to Dembo, Burkina Faso, on motorcycles and in pickup trucks. They opened fire on a militia group called Volunteers for the Defense of the Homeland (VDP), which works with the Burkinabé military to protect the areas of northwest Burkina Faso near its border with Mali. These men killed seven members of the VDP. Three days later, on February 12, at the other end of Burkina Faso near the border with Ghana and Togo, armed men entered Yargatenga and killed 12 people, including two VDP fighters. Meanwhile, in another incident that took place from February 9 night until the next day—further north of Burkina Faso near the border with Mali—men on motorcycles arrived at the Sanakadougou village and killed 12 people, burning homes, and looting “the few goods and livestock of the villagers,” reported a survivor to Agence France-Presse. These are not isolated incidents. They have become commonplace in Burkina Faso, where about 40 percent of the country is now largely controlled by a wide range of armed groups who began to target the Sahel after 2012.
Three peacekeepers from Senegal were killed and five seriously injured after their convoy hit an improvised explosive device in central Mali, the U.N. peacekeeping mission in the country and Senegal’s army said on Tuesday.
Some yet-to-be-identified gunmen on Monday evening reportedly blew off the administrative offices of the Okehi local government area of Kogi State.
Le colonel Mamady Doumbouya s’est engagé auprès des Etats ouest-africains à rendre le pouvoir aux civils au bout de deux ans à compter du 1er janvier 2023.
Le chef de la junte en Guinée, le colonel Mamady Doumbouya, a réaffirmé mardi 21 février qu’il quittera le pouvoir à l’issue de la transition fin 2024, lors du lancement de la rédaction de la nouvelle Constitution, un an et demi après le coup d’Etat qui a renversé le président Alpha Condé.
Les islamistes combattent depuis 2007 le gouvernement fédéral soutenu par la communauté internationale. Chassés des principales villes, ils restent implantés dans de vastes zones rurales.
Dix civils ont été tués mardi 21 février en Somalie dans une attaque revendiquée par les islamistes radicaux chabab dans la capitale, a annoncé le gouvernement. Vers 15 heures, des Chabab ont « attaqué une maison dans le district d’Abdiaziz », au nord de Mogadiscio, selon un communiqué du gouvernement, précisant que trois personnes ont été blessées. Les forces de sécurité somaliennes « ont secouru et extrait de nombreux civils de cette maison et dans les immeubles aux alentours », selon les autorités, qui ont précisé que les quatre assaillants ont été tués.
Les attaques djihadistes continuent de susciter la consternation mais aussi des interrogations sur la stratégie mise en place par la junte au pouvoir pour y mettre un terme.
Au Burkina Faso, à la suite de la mort, vendredi dernier, de 51 soldats tués lors d’une attaque djihadiste sur l’axe Déo-Oursi, dans la province de l’Oudalan au Sahel, les Burkinabè sont en deuil. Certains s’interrogent aussi sur la stratégie mise en place par la junte au pouvoir mais personne n’ose émettre des réserves par crainte de représailles. 160 djihadistes auraient par ailleurs été tués selon le bilan actualisé de l’état-major général de l’armée burkinabè et des opérations de ratissages se poursuivraient dans cette zone.
The Sudanese military-led transitional government and several armed signatories to the Juba peace agreement on Sunday signed a two-year new implementation matrix for implementing the pact.
The transitional government in Khartoum and the armed groups signed a peace agreement on October 3, 2020, but the lack of money, the power struggle between the civilian and military components and a coup d’etat in October 2021 complicated the implementation process.
France’s defence minister pledged on Monday to boost military support to Ivory Coast, as Paris adjusts its strategy in West Africa after neighbouring Burkina Faso ordered French troops to leave and vowed to curb a worsening Islamist insurgency solo.
The army in Burkina Faso says more than 50 soldiers were killed in an attack by presumed Islamists in the north.
It said in a statement that 51 bodies had been found so far, several soldiers were still missing and three wounded soldiers had been evacuated from the scene.