Jihadist rebels have embarked on deadly missions which have seen blowing up two bridges in northern Burkina Faso in a bid to isolate key towns in the region, army authorities have claimed.
According to military authorities, some highway bridges at Wousse and Nare were blown up almost simultaneously blown up last Friday,
Residents in Dori and Djibo told newsmen that their towns remained inaccessible by road on Tuesday.
Africa Today News, New York reports that the Nare bridge had recently been repaired after being damaged in a bomb blast on June 30.
Read Also: At Least Six Killed In Burkina In Suspected Jihadist Attacks
The attacks are ‘an attempt to isolate’ the towns, the military disclosed.
Africa Today News, New York reports that despite being one of the world’s poorest countries, Burkina Faso has been shaken by jihadist raids since 2015, with the movements linked to Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group.
Thousands of people have been killed and around 1.9 million displaced.
The government only controls around 60 percent of the country, West Africa’s mediator for the country said last month.
Burkina Faso’s ruling junta had some time last month announced it had resolved to create two “zones of military interest” in the north and east of the country that are reputed havens for jihadists.
In these areas, ‘human presence is forbidden’ — a move aimed at giving the army freer range to crack down on the rebels.
Blowing up the bridges ‘could aim at preventing people from leaving the military zones and enable the terrorists to remain mingled with the population,’ thus hampering the operation, said Mahamoudou Sawadogo, a security expert.
Other attacks in the north this year have ‘systematically’ targeted telecommunications and strategic installations, including an airfield at Ouahigouya, he said.