Among the victims of Thursday\u2019s attack was Ladji Yoro, considered a leader of the VDP in Burkina Faso
\n ABIDJAN
\nBurkina Faso\u2019s government declared two days of mourning starting on Sunday after 41 people died in an attack by suspected extremists in the troubled north.
\n\u201cThe search mission in the area of an ambush by armed terrorist groups… has established a toll of 41 bodies. The president decrees national mourning of 48 hours,\u201d said a government statement issued on Saturday evening.
\nThe government said the dead included members of an official self-defense force known as the Volunteers for the Defense of the Motherland (VDP), set up to support the army.
\nVolunteers receive 14 days of training and are then sent out on patrols and surveillance missions, equipped with light arms.
\nAmong the victims of Thursday\u2019s attack was Ladji Yoro, considered a leader of the VDP in Burkina Faso, the statement said.
\n\u201cThe identification of the victims is still underway,\u201d said the government statement.
\nAccording to local media, the ambush targeted a convoy of traders escorted by VDP near Ouahigouya, a town not far from the Mali border.
\nThe attack was the deadliest since mid-November when 57 people, including 53 gendarmes, were killed.
\nLike its neighbors Mali and Niger, Burkina Faso has been caught up in a spiral of violence since 2015, attributed to armed militant groups affiliated to Al-Qaeda and Daesh.
\nThe fighting has left at least 2,000 people dead and 1.4 million displaced.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Among the victims of Thursday\u2019s attack was Ladji Yoro, considered a leader of the VDP in Burkina Faso ABIDJAN Burkina Faso\u2019s government declared two days of mourning starting on Sunday after 41 people died in an attack by suspected extremists in the troubled north. \u201cThe search mission in the area of an ambush by armed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":235190,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[6],"tags":[2184,2186,2187,2185],"class_list":{"0":"post-235179","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-burkina-faso","9":"tag-extremist","10":"tag-kill","11":"tag-suspected"},"yoast_head":"\n