Deputy mayor among 4 killed in Burkina Faso ambush: sources

• Four people including the deputy mayor of a northern Burkina Faso city were killed in an ambush on Sunday.
• The deputy mayor of Djibo and three companions were killed in an attack by unidentified armed assailants.
• The country's northern provinces have been battling a four-year-old wave of militant violence.

OUAGADOUGOU: Four people including the deputy mayor of a northern Burkina Faso city were killed in an ambush on Sunday in an area plagued by recurrent militant attacks, sources said.

"The deputy mayor of Djibo and three companions were killed in an attack by unidentified armed assailants," an administrative source told AFP.

It marks the latest deadly attack in the troubled north of the West African country, which is battling a militant revolt that has claimed hundreds of lives.

"The deputy mayor's vehicle was ambushed in the Gaskinde area," a security source said, adding that the other victims were a driver, the deputy mayor's cousin and a town hall officer.

On Friday, a police commissioner was killed in another assault by gunmen on a police station in northwestern Burkina Faso.

Burkina Faso is an impoverished and politically fragile country in the heart of the Sahel, and its security forces are badly-equipped, poorly trained and under-funded.

The country's northern provinces have been battling a four-year-old wave of militant violence that came from neighbouring Mali.

The attacks -- typically hit-and-run raids on villages, road mines and suicide bombings -- have claimed more than 630 lives nationally, according to an AFP toll. Nearly 500,000 people have been forced to flee their homes.

The attack targeting mayor Oumarou Dicko also comes as 51 Malian soldiers and one French soldier were killed on Friday and Saturday in Mali.

Mali and Burkina Faso are among the countries in the Sahel region of Africa caught in the eye of a militant storm since 2012.

The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the death of 49 of the 51 Malian soldiers killed and the French solider.