The death toll of an attack on civilians and soldiers in northern Burkina Faso has risen to 80, the government said in a statement on Thursday.
The attack occurred on Wednesday when Islamist militants attacked a civilian convoy escorted by military police near the town of Arbinda, the latest in a series of attacks in the Sahel region of West Africa this month.
Fifty-nine civilians, six pro-government militiamen and 15 military police were killed, the government and army said Thursday. The initial death toll was estimated at 47 on Wednesday.
Security forces said 80 militants were also killed.
Violence in the Sahel, a strip of arid land bordering the southern edge of the Sahara Desert, has intensified in recent years despite the presence of thousands of UN, regional and Western troops.
The violence, centered on the border regions of Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso, has killed thousands of civilians and displaced millions since 2018.
On Monday, gunmen killed 37 civilians, including 14 children, in an attack on a village in Niger. An attack in central Mali on Thursday left 15 people dead.
The Sahel was plunged into chaos by the 2012 takeover of northern Mali by militants linked to al-Qaeda.
France intervened the following year to push them back. But armed Islamists have regrouped and expanded their operations, rendering large areas of the Sahel ungovernable.
(AFP)
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