Two villages in Niger Republic’s vast Tillaberi border region came under attack from gunmen which led to the death of 12 people working in the fields.
A municipal official in the Anzourou district disclosed the attack.
The 12 people killed were all male and from the villages of Doukou Saraou and Doukou Makani, which lie barely a kilometre (half a mile) apart, the official said.
The unstable and arid Tillaberi region lies in the tri-border zone where southwestern Niger meets Mali and Burkina Faso — a hot spot of activity for insurgents linked to Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group.
Despite a state of emergency and deployment of large numbers of anti-jihadist forces, attacks are common.
French soldiers are fighting alongside Nigerien counterparts in Tillaberi, the authorities in both countries say.
Last week the United Nations stated that nearly 11,000 people in southwestern Niger had fled their homes this month.
According to UN, the Tillaberi region has 150,000 internally displaced people.
Several villages in Anzourou district were hit between May 2020 and August 2021 when dozens of people were massacred by gunmen on motorbikes.
Niger is also fighting long-running jihadist violence in its southeast, which spills across the border from Nigeria.
