Massacre in Burkina Faso left 600 dead, double previous estimates, according to French security assessment

[the bossman]

Burkina needs to stay strong

How?

 

[MikelArteta]

SAD
Rip to my brothers and sisters

 

[Biblical Goon]

I don’t believe for a moment this is the result of Islamic terrorist. Who’s been colonizing Burkina Faso for the last century? France reporting this as if they wasn’t kicked out for literally doing the same thing. Islam is such a easy scapegoat

 

[MikelArteta]

That open border should be concerning when you read shyt like this

also scary in africa as so many countries accepts refugees with no idea who they are etc.

 

[African Peasant]

How?

By destroying those criminals

 

[Tair]

I don’t believe for a moment this is the result of Islamic terrorist. Who’s been colonizing Burkina Faso for the last century? France reporting this as if they wasn’t kicked out for literally doing the same thing. Islam is such a easy scapegoat

It's true. France being kicked out left a power vacuum, and Islamic militants are scrambling to fill it (not like they haven't been trying).

...

Violent Extremism in the Sahel
By the Center for Preventive Action
Updated February 14, 2024

The persistent and growing strength of violent extremist organizations in the Sahel threatens to exacerbate the humanitarian crisis and spread instability across Africa, posing significant security and financial risks to the United States and Europe. The continuing collapse of international counterterrorism support, as well as weakening leadership in regional efforts, has created a vacuum in which violent extremism can expand. Organizations including Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wal Muslimeen (JNIM), Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS), Islamic State in the West African Province (ISWAP), and others have already taken advantage of that vacuum, using countries in the region as platforms to launch indiscriminate attacks on government forces and civilians alike. Other non-state actors, such as the Wagner Group, have also capitalized on the absence of foreign involvement to expand their influence. The possible convergence of security threats, including increased cooperation among  terrorist organizations, and between terrorist and criminal organizations, could intensify the danger those groups pose in the region and beyond.

Background
Spanning the area from Senegal to Eritrea, situated between the Sahara to the north and the African tropics to the south, the Sahel region has long faced severe, complex security and humanitarian crises. Since gaining independence in the 1960s, many countries in the Sahel have experienced violent extremism due to the confluence of weak and illegitimate governance, economic decline, and the worsening effects of climate change. Violence, conflict, and crime have surged over the last decade, transcending national borders and posing significant challenges to countries both in and outside the region. The Sahel remains a principal transit point for migrants traveling from sub-Saharan Africa to northern coastal states and on to Europe. Further violence could exponentially increase the rate of displacement and migration from the region, compounding pressures on northern and coastal African states and Europe. The epicenters of violence and humanitarian disaster are in the Liptako-Gourma and Lake Chad Basin subregions.

Liptako-Gourma is in the central Sahel, in the borderlands of Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger. Current instability is associated with the collapse of the Libyan state in 2011, which led to the proliferation of weapons and armed fighters in the region. The influx of extremists into northern Mali reignited the dormant Tuareg rebellion [PDF] in 2012, which had previously surfaced in 1963, 1990, and 2006. Representing only 10 percent of the Malian population, the Tuareg people, organized under the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA), sought an autonomous state and aligned themselves with multiple Islamist groups, including al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), the Movement for Unity and Jihad in West Africa (MUJAO), and Ansar Dine to push government forces out of the north. Then-President Amadou Toumani Touré was deposed in a March 2012 coup by the army, which disapproved of the government’s failure to suppress the rebellion. The consequent collapse of state institutions in the north enabled the MNLA to capture the regional capitals of Gao, Kidal, and Timbuktu; the group had declared the independent state of Azawad [PDF] in northern Mali by April. The MNLA quickly split from al-Qaeda and other allied Islamist groups in June following their attempt to impose Islamic law and declare an Islamic caliphate over the northern territory. 

After a period of relative calm, the crisis deteriorated in January 2013 as AQIM, MUJAO, and Ansar Dine pushed further south to capture Konna in central Mali. In August, Mali transitioned back to a civilian-led government under Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta, which later signed a peace agreement with a coalition of Tuareg independence groups including the MNLA in 2015. The coalition excluded Islamist organizations, which quickly took advantage of the agreement to expand their control, spreading further into central Mali and neighboring Burkina Faso and Niger. Liptako-Gourma has since become a hotbed for violent extremism in the Sahel. 

Notable attacks  targeting the Radisson Blu Hotel in Mali, the Splendid Hotel in Burkina Faso, and L’Etoule du Sud Hotel in Ivory Coast in 2015 and 2016 demonstrated the extent of the Islamist threat to the Sahel and West Africa. In September 2016, the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara  (ISGS) surfaced in Burkina Faso, launching its first major attack on a border post near the Burkinabe city of Markoye. In 2017, several al-Qaeda affiliates merged to form Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal Muslimeen (JNIM). The emergence of ISGS and JNIM have intensified violence in the Sahel. Both JNIM and ISGS have pushed farther south in Liptako-Gourma, threatening the security of West Africa’s relatively stable coastal states. JNIM has more recently gained control over territory in northern and central Mali, while ISGS has been confined to northern Burkina Faso and western Niger due to clashes with JNIM that began in 2020.

Violent extremism in the Lake Chad Basin at the intersection of Cameroon, Chad, Niger, and Nigeria prevailed in the same period with the reemergence of Boko Haram in northern Nigeria. Founded by Muhammed Yusuf in northeastern Nigeria in 2002, Boko Haram was forced underground in 2009 after Nigerian police forces killed over seven hundred members, including Yusuf, during a raid that July.  In June and August 2011, Boko Haram resurfaced, indicating its more expansive and aggressive strategy by launching suicide attacks [PDF] on police and the UN headquarters in Abuja, Nigeria. The group gained international notoriety following its abduction of 276 girls from the town of Chibok, Nigeria, giving rise to the global Bring Back Our Girls movement in April 2014. 

In 2015, Boko Haram pledged allegiance to the self-proclaimed Islamic State and rebranded as the Islamic State in the West African Province (ISWAP). A splinter faction of the original Boko Haram was active until 2021, when ISWAP killed its leader, absorbed its territory, and relegated its members to remote islands in Lake Chad. ISWAP has since established control of northeastern Nigeria and parts of Niger.

Experts attribute the expansion of violent extremism in the Sahel to persistently weak governance, characterized by corruption, democratic backsliding, legitimacy deficits, and human rights violations. Many countries in the region share similar internal dynamics of inequality [PDF]—state power tends to be concentrated in southern, urban regions while rural, northern areas remain underdeveloped and ripe for exploitation by extremist groups. Thus, Sahel countries are consistently ranked high on the Fragile State Index, particularly Chad, Mali, and Nigeria. Frequent transfers of power are also a problem: Chad, Burkina Faso, Mali, Mauritania, and Niger experienced a combined twenty-five successful coups d’état between 1960 and 2022. Consecutive military coups in Mali in 2020 and 2021, resulting in Mali’s current interim government under a military junta, launched the region’s most recent so-called coup epidemic, which saw similar occurrences in Burkina Faso, Chad, and Niger.

Violent Extremism in the Sahel | Global Conflict Tracker

Learn about the world's top hotspots with this interactive Global Conflict Tracker from the Center for Preventive Action at the Council on Foreign Relations.

www.cfr.org

There are links in that article with even more detail so you can get caught up on what's happening.

 

[voiture]

It's true. France being kicked out left a power vacuum, and Islamic militants are scrambling to fill it (not like they haven't been trying).

...

Isn’t their reason for kicking out France was that Russia will do a better job stopping the Islamic terrorists? How is Wagner doing in Mali and Burkina Faso?

 

[ignorethis]

Traore needs to get a handle on the Islamist problem.

How can he get a handle on a problem that has been giving hell to every African nation, European nations, the Middle East, and America for the past 30 years.

People have to realize that Islam has its own political power structure beyond that of traditional government.

These militants are being funded by some of the richest people on Earth. They hold political positions and control governments in the Middle East and Africa.

But more importantly they control the religious beliefs of billions of people.

The next major conflict in West Africa is Muslim vs non-Muslims, I been saying this for 10 years now.

There are good Muslim people in Africa of course, but the Muslims with the power are too power hungry and really believe Allah intended for them to rule over all of Africa.

And they have billionaire (possibly trillionaires) Arabs funding that mentality.

 

[MVike28]

How can he get a handle on a problem that has been giving hell every African nation, European nations, the Middle East, and America for the past 30 years.

People have to realize that Islam has its own political power structure beyond that of traditional government.

These militants are being funded by some of the richest people on Earth. They hold political positions and control governments in the Middle East and Africa.

But more importantly they control the religious believes of billions of people.

The next major conflict in West Africa is Muslim vs non-Muslims, I been saying this for 10 years now.

There are good Muslim people in Africa of course, but the Muslims with the power are too power hungry and really believe Allah intended for them to rule over all of Africa.

And they have billionaire (possibly trillionaires) Arabs funding that mentality.

Elite TLR posting

Just amazing

 

[MVike28]

I don’t believe for a moment this is the result of Islamic terrorist. Who’s been colonizing Burkina Faso for the last century? France reporting this as if they wasn’t kicked out for literally doing the same thing. Islam is such a easy scapegoat

Citing French reports is like citing the Israel Times on stories related to their genocidal army.

nikkas already fell for it in the replies above.

Never change Coli.

 

[Adeptus Astartes]

How can he get a handle on a problem that has been giving hell every African nation, European nations, the Middle East, and America for the past 30 years.

People have to realize that Islam has its own political power structure beyond that of traditional government.

These militants are being funded by some of the richest people on Earth. They hold political positions and control governments in the Middle East and Africa.

But more importantly they control the religious believes of billions of people.

The next major conflict in West Africa is Muslim vs non-Muslims, I been saying this for 10 years now.

There are good Muslim people in Africa of course, but the Muslims with the power are too power hungry and really believe Allah intended for them to rule over all of Africa.

And they have billionaire (possibly trillionaires) Arabs funding that mentality.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't one of the reasons for the coup lack of security in regards to Islamist attacks? If this article is correct, they aren't even really trying. They allegedly put these people out there to dig defensive trenches with little or no security. I thought Russia/Wagner was supposed to be helping them, but they have bigger fish to fry back home.

 

[desjardins]

On one hand this is believable because the jihadists have been wildin in the region for 10-15 yrs
On the other hand the reported severity of the attack could be propaganda to make it seem like Traore has no control and a new leader has to be installed
If the report of Wagner being hired to protect him is true that ain't a good look, I thought they were mercenaries getting paid to go into the bush to hunt jihadist

 

[Secure Da Bag]

@☑︎#VoteDemocrat

Is right on this.

Islamic militancy is spreading like wildfire and is being backed by either the Islamic state or the UAE. Folks aren't talking about that which is very unfortunate.

How do you know they're not being backed by France?

 

[morris]

damn

the situation gets dire everyday

 

[num123]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't one of the reasons for the coup lack of security in regards to Islamist attacks? If this article is correct, they aren't even really trying. They allegedly put these people out there to dig defensive trenches with little or no security. I thought Russia/Wagner was supposed to be helping them, but they have bigger fish to fry back home.

The first coup was for that reason and the person that participated in that coup took over in another coup right after. Has been doing more terrorizing of the populace and people not for the junta than the militants.

Going to be interesting to see the Traore dikk suckers in this forum react when he gets overthrown like he has done two times before.