The Human Rights Watch (HRW) stated on Wednesday that the armed group Islamic State in the Sahel Province (IS Sahel) has demonstrated a concerning increase in attacks against civilians, reporting that since March, the group has illegally executed 127 people in western Niger.
Reports reveal five separate armed attacks by the group in Tillabéri during that time frame, with the group killing 70 mosque-goers in a mass execution in June. HRW reported that a woman who lost three sons in the massacre said there were “bodies everywhere, one on top of the other.”
On May 13, IS Sahel reportedly attacked a residential area and burned “at least a dozen homes.” A herder allegedly found two children dead from a gunshot. Despite no group claiming responsibility for these violent attacks, eyewitnesses insist that the IS Sahel was the perpetrator. HRW claimed these attacks constitute war crimes and direct violations of human rights.
The IS of Sahel and Niger’s military junta has faced mounting scrutiny and criticism from international onlookers. Senior researcher at HRW, Ilaria Allegrozzi, stated, “Nigerian authorities need to do more to protect people living in the Tillabéri region.”
The military junta has been in power since staging a coup against former president Mohamed Bezoum on July 26, 2023. Since their rise to power, approximately 1,600 civilian deaths have been recorded. Pressure is increasingly being placed on the military junta to mitigate further attacks, with Niger turning to countries such as Turkey and Russia for aid against IS Sahel fighters.
The UN has condemned the armed group’s violence, describing its actions as violations of international humanitarian law. The Security Council, in August, released a comprehensive forecast of the region aimed at organizing an international response. UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, reprimanded IS Sahel’s March attack as “in stark violation of international human rights law and humanitarian law,” particularly under Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions.
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