Henry Wilkins

Pan-African fes­ti­val opens in Burk­i­na Faso’s cap­i­tal months af­ter be­ing de­layed by the coro­n­avirus pan­dem­ic.

France says sev­en-year Sa­hel op­er­a­tion will come to an end, in­di­cat­ing troop draw­down and re­struc­tur­ing of its pres­ence.

Dozens of men, women and chil­dren per­ished in sin­gle dead­liest at­tack in Burk­i­na Faso since its con­flict be­gan in 2015.

Gov­ern­ment move caus­es con­cern about press free­dom and the vis­i­bil­i­ty of the coun­try’s hu­man­i­tar­i­an cri­sis.

Chad’s neigh­bours and West­ern al­lies anx­ious about sta­bil­i­ty of na­tion cen­tral in fight against re­gion’s armed groups.

Court in­dicts Burk­i­na Faso’s ex­iled for­mer pres­i­dent for al­leged com­plic­i­ty in 1987 mur­der of man he re­moved in coup.

De­cline rais­es many ques­tions, es­pe­cial­ly since the num­ber of vi­o­lent in­ci­dents has re­mained the same.

France ex­pect­ed to an­nounce Barkhane troop draw­down as Sa­hel lead­ers in­creas­ing­ly mull ne­go­ti­a­tions with armed groups.

Could Burk­in­abe pres­i­dent’s sec­ond term see a new ap­proach to se­cu­ri­ty or could spi­ral­ing vi­o­lence trig­ger civ­il un­rest?

Burk­in­abes go to the polls on Sun­day as the coun­try faces an es­ca­lat­ing hu­man­i­tar­i­an and eco­nom­ic cri­sis.