Issiaka Ouattara, a key figure in the years-long unrest that gripped Ivory Coast at the start of the century, has died in a New York hospital at the age of 53, associates said on Monday.

“He died from illness this morning in a New York hospital,” where he had been admitted several weeks ago, Affoussiata Bamba-Lamine, an attorney linked to former rebel commander Guillaume Soro, told AFP.

“One of the pillars of September 19 2002 has fallen,” Soro said on Twitter, referring to the start of a revolt in northern Ivory Coast that split the country in two.

The crisis came to a violent head in 2010 when President Laurent Gbagbo, who had ruled the country since 2000, was declared winner in elections, an outcome disputed by the international community.

Opposition candidate Alassan Ouattara, who was not related to Issiaka Ouattara, began a military offensive, eventually capturing and arresting Gbagbo in April 2011 with the support of French troops.

Ouattara — nicknamed Wattao — was one of the the rebellion’s most prominent “zone commanders” (“com’zones” in French), well known for his taste in bling jewellery, gap teeth and giant stature.

He was given control over the rich cocoa-growing region of Vavou, in central-western Ivory Coast, at the head of an armed unit called Anaconda.

The com’zones played a key part in bringing Ouattara to power.

They were rewarded with major positions, despite complaints by civil society that their men had committed numerous crimes during the 2010-211 fighting.

“Wattao” was appointed second in command of the elite Republican Guard, and had recently been promoted to the rank of senior colonel.

He had been suffering from acute diabetes, according to the website Jeune Afrique.

Source: AFP

Chad has ended a mission spanning several months fighting Boko Haram in neighbouring Nigeria and withdrawn its 1,200-strong force across their common border, an army spokesman told AFP on Saturday.

“It’s our troops who went to aid Nigerian soldiers months ago returning home. They have finished their mission,” spokesman Colonel Azem Bermandoa told AFP. “None of our soldiers remains in Nigeria,” he added, without specifying whether they might be replaced following Friday’s pullout.

“Those who have come back will return to their sector at Lake Chad,” Bermandoa said.

However, Chad’s general chief of staff General Tahir Erda Tahiro said that if countries in the region which have contributed to a multinational anti-jihadist force were in agreement, more troops will likely be sent in.

“If the states around Lake Chad agree on a new mission there will surely be another contingent redeployed on the ground,” Tahiro told AFP.

At least 35,000 deaths

Boko Haram began the insurrection in Nigeria a decade ago, leading to at least 35,000 deaths with violence spilling over into Chad, Niger and Cameroon.

A Boko Haram faction aligned with Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) jihadists is highly active around Lake Chad where the group has training bases on the Niger border and regularly carries out raids on military bases and regional security forces.

Last month saw 14 people killed with 13 more listed as missing after an attack on a fishing village in western Chad.

Countries in the region have banded together to fight Boko Haram and ISWAP with support from civilian defence committees leading to Chad contributing 1,200 troops.

Those troops have now pulled back across the border to be “deployed in the Lake Chad region to strengthen security along the border,” a senior local official told AFP.

Cameroon says it is battling an upsurge in Boko Haram attacks and, according to an Amnesty International report published last month 275 people, including 225 civilians, were killed there last year.

Source: AFP

Fourteen civilians, mostly schoolchildren, died Saturday when a roadside bomb blew up their bus in northwestern Burkina Faso, a security source told AFP.

Four people were seriously hurt in the blast in Sourou province near the Mali border, the source added, as children returned to school after holidays.

“The vehicle hit a homemade bomb on the Toeni-Tougan road,” a second security source said. “Most of the dead are schoolchildren.”

Meanwhile, the army reported an attack against gendarmes at Inata in the north on Friday, saying “a dozen terrorists were neutralised”.

Security sources said the bus was carrying high school students returning from the Christmas holiday

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack but jihadist violence in Burkina Faso has been blamed on militants linked to both Al-Qaeda and Islamic State groups.

The deaths came the week after 35 people, most of them women, were massacred in an attack on the northern city of Arbinda and seven Burkinabe troops were killed in a separate attack on their army base nearby.

Burkina Faso, bordering Mali and Niger, has seen frequent jihadist attacks which have left hundreds of people dead since the start of 2015 when Islamist extremist violence began to spread across the Sahel region.

The north of the country has been worst hit, with the capital Ouagadougou not immune to attacks.

In a televised address on Tuesday President Roch Marc Christian Kabore insisted that “victory” against “terrorism” was assured.

The entire Sahel region is fighting jihadist insurgency with help from Western countries, but has not managed to stem the bloodshed.

Five Sahel states – Burkina Faso, Mali, Mauritania, Niger and Chad – have joined forces to combat terrorism in the fragile region that lies between the Sahara and Atlantic.

Backed by former colonial power France, the G5 Sahel was created to great fanfare in 2014.

The centre piece of its strategy has been an initiative, launched in July 2017, to pool 5,000 troops from the five countries to wrench back control from ruthless jihadist groups.

But, hamstrung by insufficient funds, training and equipment, the force has only now reached a complement of 4,000 troops, and for many analysts seems to be losing the battle.

The nimble rebels have spread from Mali to Burkina Faso and Niger, as well as Chad.

Their hit-and-run raids are inflicting a mounting human, economic and political toll, sparking fears that the coastal countries to the south are next in line.

Since 2015, increasingly deadly Islamist attacks in Burkina have killed more than 750 people according to an AFP count, and forced 560,000 people from their homes according to UN figures.

(AFP)