15 killed in jihadist attack in Burkina Faso

Armed men described as jihadists raided a village in Burkina Faso's restive north, killing 15 people, plundering and burning shops and motorbikes, a regional governor said Saturday.

The raid took place on the night of Thursday to Friday with "around 20 individuals attacking the village of Diblou," said a security source who put the death toll at 14.

But a statement by the governor of the Centre-Nord region, Casimir Segueda, said that 15 people were killed, and the village's market torched. A local resident said that "the terrorists burnt shops and motorcycles".

"Almost the entire market was looted," the resident added.

The poor Sahel state has been battling a rising wave of jihadist attacks over the last four years which began in the north but have since spread to the east, near the border with Togo and Benin.

Most attacks in the former French colony are attributed to the jihadist group Ansarul Islam, which emerged near the Mali border in December 2016, and to the JNIM (Group to Support Islam and Muslims), which has sworn allegiance to Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.

Those groups are believed to be responsible for around 500 deaths since 2015. The capital Ouagadougou has been attacked three times.