Burkina jihadist attacks on army leave at least 10 dead

A soldier salutes after receiving a medal during the 62nd anniversary of the creation of the Burkina Faso Armed Forces at the Nation Square in Ouagadougou on November 1, 2022. [AFP]

A series of jihadist attacks on army detachments in Burkina Faso's north and east this week left at least 10 people dead, security sources told AFP on Sunday.

Burkina Faso, ruled by a military junta since a 2022 coup, has been plagued with violence from militants allied to Al-Qaeda or the Islamic State group for more than a decade.

Social media has been awash with speculation that the spate of attacks may have killed dozens of soldiers, but AFP was unable to independently verify those claims by Sunday.

The junta, which seized power on the promise to crack down on the violence, has ceased to communicate on the west African country's jihadist attacks.

On Saturday, the Burkinabe army's unit in Titao, the capital of the northern province of Loroum, was "targeted by a group of several hundred terrorists", a security source in the region told AFP.

While the source did not give a death toll, they said part of the military base was destroyed in the attack.

The interior minister of Ghana, which borders Burkina Faso to the south, said the government had "received disturbing information from Burkina Faso of a truck carrying tomato traders from Ghana which was caught in a terrorist attack in Titao" on the same day.

"The Ghana embassy in Burkina Faso is liaising with the officials of Burkina Faso to visit the attack site for details and identification of Ghanaians caught in the attack," the minister added.

According to the same security source, another army base in Tandjari, in the east of the country, was also attacked on Saturday, leaving several officers dead.

"This series of attacks is not a coincidence," the source said. "There seems to be coordination among the jihadists."

A separate security source told AFP that a "terrorist group attacked the (military) detachment in Bilanga", in the east of the country, on Thursday.

"Much of the detachment was ransacked," the source said, giving a toll of "about 10 deaths" among the soldiers and civilian volunteers fighting alongside the Burkinabe army.

A local source in the region confirmed the attack, adding that there was damage in the town of Bilanga, with the assailants remaining at the scene until the day after.

Despite the junta's vow to restore security to Burkina Faso within months, the country remains caught in a spiral of violence.

According to the ACLED conflict monitor, the unrest has killed tens of thousands of civilians and soldiers since 2015, with more than half of those deaths coming in the past three years.