Twelve Nigerien farmers were killed on Thursday in their fields during a double attack by armed men in two villages of Anzourou, a town in the Tillabéri region (southwest) near Mali, local and security sources told AFP on Friday.
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“There were 12 deaths following the attack carried out Thursday afternoon at 2:00 p.m. local time (1:00 p.m. GMT) by armed men,” an official from the town hall of Anzourou told AFP. According to a list of victims provided to AFP by this official, all are men.
The attacks targeted Doukou Saraou and Doukou Makani, two villages less than one km apart administered by the commune of Anzourou.
A security source “confirmed” the attacks without giving an assessment.
The immense and unstable region of Tillabéri is located in the so-called “three borders” zone between Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso, regularly hit by jihadist groups affiliated with Al-Qaeda or the Islamic State (IS).
These groups carry out their attacks there despite the massive deployment of anti-jihadist forces and the state of emergency in force. French soldiers are fighting them alongside Nigerien soldiers, according to the authorities of the two countries.
Several villages in Anzourou had already been targeted by attacks between May 2020 and August 2021: dozens of people had been massacred there in their homes and fields, or in mosques, by armed men who came on motorcycles.
In 2022, a food crisis hit this area hard due to lack of rain and attacks by suspected jihadists. Many peasants who dared to cultivate their fields had been killed.
In 2021, the authorities had to resettle in the regional capital Tillabéri 12,000 inhabitants who had fled their villages after a series of attacks and ultimatums launched by jihadist groups.