At least a hundred people, mostly civilians, were killed on Saturday in Barsalogho, in the Centre-North region of Burkina Faso, as they were digging trenches around their town to protect themselves from jihadist attacks. Gunmen arrived on motorcycles and began shooting indiscriminately at the population. The terrorist organization Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (JNIM), linked to Al Qaeda, claimed responsibility for the massacre hours later. The civilians had been forced to carry out this task by the president of the military junta that has ruled the country since 2022, Captain Ibrahim Traoré.
Although the exact number of deaths is unknown, this is one of the worst attacks against civilians in recent years in Burkina Faso. Various sources say there are between 100 and 200 dead, according to Europa Press, as well as 140 wounded who were taken to the hospital in Kaya, located some 45 kilometres away, and to various health centres in the region. Among the dead are numerous members of the Volunteers for the Defence of the Fatherland (VDP), a civilian structure created by the Burkinabe government to help the military in the fight against terrorism. The attackers also captured weapons and a military ambulance.
The Centre-North region is a frequent scene of ambushes, attacks and explosives by the local branch of JNIM, the most active jihadist group in the central Sahel. At the same time, it is a region where tens of thousands of internally displaced people have settled, fleeing the violence further north in the country, in the Sahel region. Barsalogho is located 145 kilometres from the capital, Ouagadougou.
Since coming to power in September 2022 through a coup d’état, Captain Traoré has set himself the main objective of fighting the jihadists and regaining control over the entire national territory. “I dedicate 80% of my time to the war,” he recently said. Despite the arrival of a hundred Russian instructors and mercenaries, they are mainly dedicated to protecting Traoré himself, who has preferred to base his strategy of reconquest in equipping itself with material resources, such as Turkish-made combat drones, and in involving the civilian population, especially through the recruitment of volunteers. Dozens of civilians have also been sent to the front as punishment for their critical stance towards the military junta.
Unarmed volunteers
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These Homeland Defense Volunteers, of whom some 30,000 are stationed on the front line of defense, receive basic military training, but in many cases lack weapons or ammunition to confront the terrorists. In fact, they have become one of the main targets of these radicals, as happened in Barsalogho this Saturday. The Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED) estimates that some 5,000 volunteers have died in various attacks since its creation in 2019. Despite the strong patriotic commitment of many of them, discontent is growing in their ranks, according to a Burkinabe source close to the VDP. For their work, they receive a bonus of about 120 euros per month.
Burkina Faso has been facing a jihadist insurgency since 2015, with a particular impact in the north, east and west of the country, which has caused thousands of deaths and more than two million internally displaced people. It is estimated that more than half of Burkinabe territory is outside state control. In large areas of the country, the defence forces are present only on the main roads and in the largest cities. Jihadist attacks against military personnel and civilians, often volunteers or their families, are constant, although the army or the VDP themselves also perpetrate this violence. Last April, Human Rights Watch accused the Armed Forces and their civilian collaborators of being responsible for the massacre of 223 people, including 56 children, in two villages in the north of the country. The Burkinabe government denied these facts.
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