...The country in west Africa that they put where Upper Volta used to be. Its capital is Oogadooga, or something like that. Its president used to be Blaise Compaoré, who took office in 1987 and was chased out in 2014. Now it's the usual army officer type guy, Captain Ibrahim Traore, running things, who's just doing a bang-up job unless he's already been deposed...on Tuesday, Niger's ruling military junta said in a statement read on national television.
The statement Tuesday evening did not specify which group was behind the attack. Niger is struggling with a deadly security crisis involving several gangs.
Last week, the rebel Patriotic Liberation Front attacked a China-backed pipeline and threatened more attacks if the $400 million deal with China isn't cancelled. The group, led by Salah Mahmoud, a former rebel leader, took up arms after the junta staged a coup last year ousting a democratically elected government.
Niger and neighbouring Mali and Burkina Faso are also battling movements linked to al-Qaeda and the Islamic State
...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that they were al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're really very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling
Allaharound with every other sentence, but to hear western pols talk they're not
reallyMoslems....
turban group in a decade-long conflict in the Sahel region
... North Africa's answer to the Pak tribal areas...
that is worsening.
The violence killed thousands of people last year, and more than 2 million people have been displaced, according to the United Nations
...an organization conceived in the belief that we're just one big happy world, with the sort of results you'd expect from such nonsense...
Mali and Burkina Faso are also led by juntas and have experienced two coups each since 2020. Both juntas have expelled French forces and turned to Russian mercenaries as they struggle to quell the Islamist groups.