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“We want justice. We want the perpetrators to be punished.”
“We want the truth to be established. We want to know why this was done to us...”
These are the words of those who survived terrible events that unfolded in two villages in Burkina Faso recently.
On the morning of February 25, eye-witnesses recount, a military convoy with more than 100 Burkinabè soldiers arrived in the village of Nondin. They came on motorbikes, in pickup trucks, and in armored cars. The soldiers went door-to-door, ordering people out of their homes.
They then rounded up villagers in groups and opened fire on them. Soldiers also shot at those trying to flee or hide.
About an hour later, the military unleashed a similar horror on the village of Soro, some five kilometers away.
By nightfall, the Burkina Faso military had summarily executed at least 223 civilians, including at least 56 children, in the two villages.
These were not the first mass killings of civilians by the military in their counterinsurgency operations, but they were the worst in nearly a decade. What we’re talking about here now looks like crimes against humanity, that is, offenses knowingly committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against the civilian population.
Survivors of the attacks in Nondin and Soro want to know who’s responsible for these massacres – who gave the orders? They want military commanders held to account.
But they also know what’s happened after other atrocities in the past: nothing. The Burkinabè authorities have repeatedly failed to investigate such abuses and repeatedly failed to prevent them from happening again.
The only real hope for survivors is that the outside world gets involved to help justice along. International assistance is critical for a credible investigation. Burkinabè authorities can not – or will not – do it alone. They should get support from the African Union and the United Nations.
“We no longer know who to confide in,” says another survivor from Soro, “when even our own soldiers massacre us.”
All they’re asking for is justice. And they deserve it.
