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Three dead in new attack on Burkina Faso church

Published

5 years ago

May 26, 2019

Three people were killed Sunday at a Catholic church in northern Burkina Faso in the latest in a series of attacks on Christian targets in the region , a security source said .
“ Heavily armed individuals attacked the church … as the faithful were celebrating Sunday mass ” in the town of Toulfe , the source said , adding that three people were killed .

Last week gunmen killed four Catholics in a religious procession , the day after a priest and five parishioners were murdered at mass .

Also last week , French special forces freed four foreign hostages in the former French colony during an overnight raid that cost the lives of two soldiers.

Burkina Faso ’ s population is around two -thirds Muslim and one – third Christian .
The semi – desert country has suffered from increasingly frequent and deadly attacks attributed to a number of jihadist groups , including the Ansarul Islam group , the Group to Support Islam and Muslims and Islamic State in the Greater Sahara.
The raids began in 2015 in the north before targeting the capital Ouagadougou and other regions , notably in the east .

Nearly 400 people have been killed since 2015 — mainly in hit – and – run raids — according to an AFP tally .
Jihadist groups target Christian clerics as well as Muslim ones they do not consider sufficiently radical in a country where traditionally both religions have co – existed peaceably.

France has deployed 4 , 500 troops in Mali, Burkina Faso , Niger and Chad in a mission codenamed Barkhane to help local forces flush out jihadists .
( AFP )