The death toll exceeds that of the attack at Inates on December 10, where 71 soldiers were killed in an Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS) attack, which had marked the highest number of fatalities suffered by Niger in a single attack to date. The violence comes as the heads of the G5 Sahel (Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger) meet French President Emmanuel Macron at Pau in France to discuss Paris’s involvement in the Sahel.
Niger, France and the UN may increase the pressure on Mali to resolve the conflicts that have spilled over into neighbouring countries.
Niger’s reputation as an 'oasis of stability' in the Sahel is increasingly untenable.
Western policies on migration and counter-terrorism could seriously destabilise northern Niger.
