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Raids claimed by militants opposed to Niger’s ruling junta have left several soldiers dead in the troubled Sahel country’s desert north, security and local sources told AFP on Sunday.
Friday’s early-morning attacks were aimed at “mixed security bases” in Seguedine, a small oasis settlement through which migrants pass en route to Libya and Europe, a north Niger security source told AFP on Sunday.
“There were several deaths and damage,” the source said, without elaborating.
A resident of the wider Bilma department where Seguedine is located told AFP that the raids “caused deaths”, while “part of the military camp and a number of vehicles were set on fire” by the assailants.
The authorities in Niger, led by the military since a July 2023 coup, had yet to comment on the attacks by Sunday afternoon.
But the raids were claimed on Saturday evening by the Patriotic Movement for Liberty and Justice (MPLJ), an armed group demanding the return of democratically elected president Mohamed Bazoum.
Bazoum has been in detention since his overthrow in the coup.
In a Facebook post, the MPLJ claimed to have left “15 victims” among Niger’s defence and security forces.
AFP was unable to verify any of the death tolls independently.
The MPLJ said it had targeted both the National Guard camp and a mixed base housing the police, the gendarmerie military force and the border post in Seguedine.
As part of its struggle for a return to civilian rule, the MPLJ has mounted sporadic attacks on a 2,000-kilometre-long (1,250-mile-long) pipeline transporting Nigerien crude to neighbouring Benin.
Both the group and its leader, Moussa Konai, are regarded as “terrorists” by the Nigerien junta.
