In a statement published on 30th January by SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors jihadist activism and communications across the globe, the Islamic State (IS) group said it was behind a lethal attack on the airport in the capital of Niger, Niamey.
The assertion of responsibility was included in the statement on the propaganda arm of the group, Amaq News Agency, that it was a “surprise and a well-flanked attack” that left people with huge losses.
The affiliate of the IS group in the region has been connected with high-profile attacks within the last few months in Nigeria, where over 120 people were killed in attacks on the Tillaberi region in September, and an American pilot was kidnapped in October.
The government of Nigeria expressed this in a statement that the attackers came in on motorcycles, and the security forces quickly drove them back, killing 20 of the attackers and arresting 11 others.
The government said that there were materials at the airport that became lost and caught fire, and other civilian aircraft that were destroyed.
Niger has faced difficulty in containing fatal jihadist bloodshed that has plagued the Sahel region of Africa, in which Burkina Faso and Mali, which also have military juntas as their governments, are also involved.
In 2025, al Qaeda and IS group-supported militants intensified their campaigns in the Sahel, which continued to spook the fragile region of Niger, the prime security partner of the West in the region until its 2023 military coup.
According to the Niger state television, one of the attacked men was French, as there were several body images with blood on the floor. It provided no evidence.
The military leader of Niger has blamed the presidents of France, Benin, and the Ivory Coast for being in support of the armed group that undertook the attack.
With access to power, military leaders in Niger, as well as neighbouring Burkina Faso and Mali, have broken relations with France and other Western powers and answered Russia with strategic military assistance to curb insurgencies.
The junta also accused the presidents of Benin and the Ivory Coast, who are the two West African states that have had a close relationship with France, of being proxies to Paris.
