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03 January 2021The toll of the attack launched by a group of militiamen against two Niger villages on the border with Mali, Tchombangou and Zaroumdareye, is over 70 civilians dead.
The attack has not yet been claimed, but it is very likely that the perpetrators were members of the jihadist groups close to al Qaeda that have been bleeding the Sahel for eight years.
The massacre takes place while the scrutiny of the results of the political elections of last December 27 is underway.
The partial figures see the Party for Democracy and Socialism, now in power, ahead.
In the north-east of Mali two French soldiers were killed by a rudimentary device.
Since 2013, the French army has been deployed in Mali with the Barkhane operation, which commits more than 5,000 soldiers to counter the jihadist uprising against the government, about fifty Paris soldiers who have died in recent years.
Five days ago, three other French soldiers were killed when a bomb exploded on the road where their convoy was passing.
The attack was claimed by the al Qaeda branch in the Sahel.
A fight in the Tipaza region, west of Algiers, resulted in the deaths of four jihadists and two soldiers.
The counter-terrorism operation during which the clash took place is still ongoing, the defense ministry said.
Algeria was the scene from 1992 to 2002 of a civil war between government troops and Islamist militias which caused about 200,000 deaths.
Despite the reconciliation signed in 2005, armed groups remain active in the country targeting the security forces, especially in the center and east.