French media The world condemned on Sunday the “suspension” of its broadcast in Burkina Faso, decided the day before by the military regime in power, denouncing “allegations as false as they are intolerable” and a desire to “prevent” independent information.
“ The world deplores the decision […] to suspend it from “all broadcast media” after the publication on Friday of an article on the jihadist attack of November 26 on a military base in Djibo (north), explains the media on its website.
He “condemns the accusations of the Burkinabe government”, which describes “his work as “tendentious”” and implies “that he would have taken the side of terrorist groups”. “So many allegations as false as they are intolerable,” continues the newspaper, whose correspondent, like that of Libération, was already expelled from Ouagadougou in April.
According to him, these sanctions “seem to respond to the desire on the part of the Burkinabe authorities to prevent the dissemination of independent information on the deterioration of the security situation in the country, while Captain Ibrahim Traoré took power in a coup of State” in October 2022 “by promising a return to peace”.
Reporters Without Borders also denounced “an obstacle to the right of Burkinabés to plural information”, calling on “the authorities to lift this suspension” on Sunday on X (formerly Twitter).
The article in question relates a “propaganda war” and “the heavy toll of an offensive” claimed by the Support Group for Islam and Muslims (GSIM).
According to the UN, 40 civilians lost their lives, with Burkinabe security sources citing “a few” soldiers killed.
The Burkina Faso Information Agency assured that “more than 400 terrorists” were killed during the counter-offensive.
“The Burkinabe government has never locked itself into a logic of propaganda,” assured the Minister of Communication, Rimtalba Jean Emmanuel Ouédraogo, on Saturday in a press release, affirming that The world “chose his side”.
“ The world “only did its job, with complete impartiality and complete independence”, responds the media, specifying that it contacted “multiple sources”, including the government which “did not follow up”, like “every time since almost a year”, while Djibo became “inaccessible to the press”.
Other media based in France have been suspended in Burkina Faso: the pan-African monthly Jeune Afrique, the LCI and France 24 channels and RFI radio.
Since 2015, the country has been plunged into a spiral of violence perpetrated by jihadist groups, which were already hitting neighboring Mali and Niger.
They have caused more than 17,000 civilian and military deaths, including more than 6,000 since the start of the year, according to the NGO Acled.