Gunmen Strike Mosque in Burkina Faso

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/12/world/africa/burkina-faso-mosque-attack.html

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OUAGADOUGOU — Gunmen killed about 15 people in an attack on a mosque in Burkina Faso during prayers on Friday evening, a security source and a local official told Reuters.

The gunmen entered the mosque in the village of Salmossi, in the north of the West African country, and opened fire, the two sources said on Saturday. Others were seriously wounded, the security source said.

The identities of the gunmen were not yet clear.

Islamist insurgents with links to the Islamic State and Al Qaeda have crossed into Burkina Faso this year from neighboring Mali, igniting ethnic and religious tensions, especially in northern regions.

The attacks have shattered a relative calm in Burkina Faso, which, until this year, had largely been spared the kind of violence that has made large parts of the Sahel region ungovernable, especially Mali.

The number of people forced to flee their homes in the worst-hit areas has increased more than sixfold since January to around 500,000, the United Nations and aid groups said Friday.

This month 20 people were killed in an attack by suspected jihadists on a gold-mining site in Burkina Faso’s north.