Five nations waging a battle against jihadi fighters in the Sahel asked the UN on Tuesday for money and other aid to help tackle a scourge which claimed more lives even as officials met.
Leaders of the so-called G5 Sahel – Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, and Niger – gathered in the Burkinabe capital Ouagadougou seeking to beef up the battle against jihadists who have killed hundreds of civilians and inflicted crippling economic damage.
In the latest incident, five security personnel were killed on Tuesday in a what the army called a “terrorist” attack in northern Burkina Faso.
In a statement issued at the close of a one-day meeting, the G5 renewed their “concern” over the situation, and called for “closer cooperation between the G5 Sahel and the United Nations”.
The radical Islamist revolt in the Sahel took off after chaos engulfed Libya in 2011. Jihadist attacks erupted in northern Mali as Boko Haram arose in northern Nigeria.