BREAKING NEWS

Burkina Faso to withdraw peacekeepers from Darfur by July

Burkina Faso has notified the United Nations that it will withdraw soldiers deployed as peacekeepers in Sudan's troubled Darfur region by July next year, the foreign minister said late on Friday.

The West African nation, which has a battalion of 850 soldiers serving in the nearly 14,000 troop strong UN-African Union hybrid mission, has suffered a series of deadly attacks at home amid a rise in Islamist militant violence.

Burkina Faso's government said in May that it would seek to bring some troops home to help reinforce domestic security.