AA/Ouagadougou/Dramane Traoré
At least 7 civilians were killed on April 4 and 5, in the city of Dori, capital of the Sahel region of Burkina Faso, in an altercation between Burkinabe soldiers and the inhabitants of this city, learned on Saturday, Anadolu from witnesses and official sources.
“During the nights of Tuesday and Wednesday, a group of soldiers descended on the “Petit-Paris” district of the city of Dori. The soldiers fired into the air and beat several people. We deplore at least seven people killed in these blunders,” city resident Ahmed Diallo told Anadolu on the phone.
The facts were committed by soldiers of the 11th Commando Infantry Regiment (11th RIC), in order to avenge one of their own who was killed on the night of April 3 to 4, 2023 at his home in circumstances not yet elucidated, said said Yacouba Cissé, another resident.
This information was confirmed by the Burkinabè Movement for Human and Peoples’ Rights (MBDHP), Séno section, which recalled in a press release that “inhuman, cruel and degrading treatment was inflicted on the populations and this, without distinction of ‘age, nor sex’.
“Shots with heavy weapons and light weapons resounded throughout the town of Dori for more than three hours. The populations were severely traumatized. Women and children were beaten by several dozen soldiers “, according to the same source.
In addition to the 7 dead, the MBDHP said that many injuries were recorded during these “punitive expeditions”.
Thursday, the prefect of the city, Abrahamané Mandé argued in an administrative note sent to Anadolu that the first leaders of the Defense and Security Forces wanted “to present their apologies to the entire population for the regrettable acts and are committed to punish the soldiers involved”.
Friday evening, the military prosecutor’s office in Burkina Faso spoke of “serious altercations” between civilians and soldiers having caused “deaths and injuries” and assured that a detailed investigation had been opened to shed light on the facts.
Clashes between soldiers and civilians are frequent in Burkina Faso.
In September 2022, scenes of violence involving soldiers took place in the Dapoya district of Ouagadougou, following the death of a soldier in the said district, then in January 2023, in the Nagrin district of Ouagadougou when a soldier was stabbed in a nightclub in said neighborhood.
The Burkinabè Movement for Human and Peoples’ Rights (MBDHP) has called on the high military hierarchy and any other authorized institution “to definitively proscribe the worn-out practice of punitive expeditions of soldiers once morest the civilian population, for the purpose of revenge “.
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