Eight; two Nigeriens including a guide and a driver, while the Six French aid workers have been killed by Gunmen on motorcycles as they visited a part of Niger popular with tourists for its wildlife.
The Governor of the Tillaberi region confirmed this news to AFP yesterday.
France confirmed its nationals were among the dead, without giving a figure.
French aid group ACTED said several of its workers were among those killed during a tourist outing.
“Among the eight people killed in Niger, several were Acted employees,” said the NGO’s lawyer Joseph Breham.
It is believed to be the first such attack on Westerners in the area, a popular tourist attraction in the former French colony thanks to its unique population of West African or Niger giraffes.
“We are managing the situation, we will give more information later,” governor Tidjani Ibrahim Katiella said, without indicating who was behind the attack.
A source close to Niger’s environmental services said the assault took place at around 11:30 am (1030 GMT) six kilometres (four miles) east of the town of Koure, which is an hour’s drive from the capital Niamey.
“Most of the victims were shot… We found a magazine emptied of its cartridges at the scene,” the source told AFP.
