At least 14 people have been killed after gunmen opened fire inside a church in Burkina Faso. The victims were attending a service on December 1 at a church in Hantoukoura, in the eastern part of the country. The identity of the gunmen is not known and the motive is unclear. Hundreds of people have been killed in the country over the past few years, mostly by jihadist groups, sparking ethnic and religious tensions especially on the border with Mali.
A statement from the regional government said that many people are injured. A security source told AFP news agency that armed individuals carried out the attack, “executing the faithful including the pastor and children”. Last October, 15 people were killed and two seriously injured in an attack on a mosque. Jihadist attacks have increased in Burkina Faso since 2015, forcing thousands of schools to close down.
The conflict spread across the border from neighboring Mali where Islamist militants took over the north of the country in 2012 before French troops pushed them out.
The number of deaths there is on track to increase 60 percent this year, compared with the toll of 1,112 in 2018, according to the Africa Center for Strategic Studies in Washington.
Roughly 500,000 people have been forced from their homes amid the unrest, the United Nations estimates. MattersIndia.com
