Flags flew at half-staff and Koranic verses played on state media on Tuesday as Niger began observing three days of national mourning for the 137 victims of coordinated raids on villages in the southwest.
The killings on Sunday represented Niger's worst civilian carnage in recent memory, surpassing an attack by suspected militants in January that killed at least 100 villagers and another last week that killed at least 58.
The scale of the violence this year has called into question claims of progress in the fight against Islamist militants by governments in West Africa's Sahel region and former colonial power France, which has 5,000 troops there to support them.
A security source blamed Sunday's assaults, which had been achieved by means of men on motorbikes in the faraway Tahoua area close to the border with Mali, on the neighborhood Islamic State associate. Islamic State has claimed duty for preceding raids in opposition to protection forces and French useful resource people.
Niger only finished a period of mourning for the preceding assaults on Friday.
The rising loss of life toll seems to be the end result of the Islamists putting themselves into ethnic conflicts between rival farming and herding groups, said Harouna Abarchi, a civil society activist who leads peace tasks inside the area.
The militants, largely drawn from the Fulani herding community, have centered civilians in retaliation for killings of Fulanis through self-defence militias shaped by way of the farmers.
"It's a fragile region that has visible inter-communal conflicts in the beyond," Abarchi stated. "They are now going after civilians, which ... Could set the sector on hearth."
The safety crisis will land at the ft of President-decide on Mohamed Bazoum, who takes workplace subsequent week, succeeding Mahamadou Issoufou.
Abou Oumarou, a retired colonel and previous local governor, stated the repeated assaults raised questions about the army's reaction.
"How is it that two hundred humans can flow around on bikes and no one is aware?" he stated. "These forces want to surround these zones so that we recognize while there is a huge motion."
The authorities said it's far investigating the attacks.
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