Burkina Faso

Narrator: The military has armed tens of thousands of people in a militia called the Volunteers for the Defense of the Homeland, commonly known as VDPs. If a community has VDPs, JNIM, one of the main Islamist armed groups, often targets the entire population.  

And government forces have massacred civilians simply for living in areas that JNIM controls.  

Narrator: The military and VDPs have especially targeted ethnic Fulani people whom they accuse of supporting JNIM.  

Entire Fulani communities have been attacked and forcibly displaced, and their property looted, acts that amount to ethnic cleansing.  

Narrator: Military abuses have fueled recruitment by JNIM and the cycle of retaliatory attacks has led to widespread violence against civilians. All sides have committed abuses that amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity. To seek justice for these crimes, we needed to identify who was responsible.  

Narrator: So, we used AI to go through thousands of hours of footage from Burkina Faso’s state-owned news channel and a social media platform used by JNIM. The software we developed identified key information about JNIM, military units, and the names of people involved in specific attacks. This information, along with witness accounts, allowed us to identify members of the Burkinabé armed forces and JNIM who were in a position of command during each attack.  

Narrator: These include: Capt. Ibrahim Traoré, the president of Burkina Faso, and top military commanders. It also includes the leaders of JNIM, such as Iyad Ag Ghaly, Amadou Kouffa, and Jafar Dicko.