Paris (AFP)
Prime Minister Jean Castex will chair a national ceremony at Orly airport on Friday to honor the six French humanitarian workers killed in Niger on Sunday, Matignon announced on Wednesday.
The ceremony will be held at 4 p.m. in the presence of families on the occasion of the repatriation of the bodies of these six French people, who worked for the NGO Acted, killed with their driver and their Nigerian guide by armed men during an excursion in the Kouré giraffe reserve, 60 km south-east of the capital Niamey.
Jean Castex denounced Tuesday "a heinous crime" and a "cowardice difficult to describe" following this attack, which is "clearly terrorist" according to President Emmanuel Macron. "France will take care not to let this heinous crime go unpunished," assured the Prime Minister.
Among the six French victims are four women: Charline F., a 30-year-old doctoral student; Stella G., who had devoted herself from 2015 to humanitarian aid; Nadifa L., who had worked for the French Ministry of the Armed Forces and Myriam D., who had joined Acted two years ago. Two young men are also among the victims: Léo R., student, and Antonin G., 26, graduate of the prestigious Ecole normale supérieure and researcher in environmental economics.
The French Ministry of Foreign Affairs has since placed the whole of Niger with the exception of the capital Niamey in the red zone on Wednesday, ie "formally discouraged".
© 2020 AFP