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One security officer was killed and two were wounded – one of them fatally - in two separate attacks in the town of Ouangolodougou, some 700 km north of Abidjan, an official source told IRIN on Thursday.
The chief of staff of Ferkessedougou District, which includes Ouangolodougou, said the first incident occurred on Friday. An off-duty gendarme wounded in that attack died on Tuesday.
In the second raid, on Sunday, one police officer died and a gendarme was critically wounded, the source said.
Ouangolodougou has “always been a town of high criminality”, the source said, adding that early reports indicated that the perpetrators were “common bandits”. In late January, an officer was knocked unconscious by an assailant and four all-terrain vehicles of the national electric company were stolen, he added. Crime is widespread in the region, and usually increases during the dry season when roads are more manageable, he said.
The official said he could not say whether there was any link between recent political unrest in Cote d’Ivoire and the attacks.
This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions