Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book rewritten, every picture has been repainted, every statue and street and building has been renamed, every date has been altered. And the process is continuing day by day and minute by minute. History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which the party is always right.
Scores of people have died in the deadliest suspected jihadist massacre ever to hit Niger, the government said Monday, underscoring the huge security challenge facing new President Mohamed Bazoum.
Government spokesman Zakaria Abdourahamane said 137 people had died in Sunday's raids in villages near Niger's border with Mali.
"In treating civilian populations systematically as targets now, these armed bandits have gone a step further into horror and brutality", Abdourahamane said in a statement read on public television.
Announcing three days of national mourning for the victims from Tuesday, he vowed that the government would reinforce security in the region and bring "the perpetrators of these cowardly and criminal acts" to justice.
Gunmen arriving on motorbikes attacked the villages of Intazayene, Bakorat and Wistane on Sunday, shooting "at everything which moved", a local official said.
Scores of people have died in the deadliest suspected jihadist massacre ever to hit Niger, the government said Monday, underscoring the huge security challenge facing new President Mohamed Bazoum.
