By Thiam Ndiaga and Anne Mimault

OUAGADOUGOU (Reuters) – Burkina Faso’s self-proclaimed army chief Captain Ibrahim Traore stated on Sunday order had been restored to the nation, following violent protests on the French embassy and days of combating as his faction tried to overthrow the federal government.

Traore’s crew urged individuals to chorus from acts of vandalism on the embassy, ​​focused by protesters after an officer concerned within the ongoing coup stated France sheltered the president Paul-Henri Damiba at a French army base within the West African nation and that he was planning a counter-offensive.

The French overseas ministry has denied that the bottom hosted Damiba after he was ousted on Friday. Damiba additionally denied being behind it, saying the studies had been a deliberate manipulation of public opinion. His whereabouts stay unknown.

“We need to inform the inhabitants that the scenario is below management and that order is being restored,” a military officer stated in a press release broadcast on nationwide tv. Traore, a military captain, stood subsequent to the officer and was flanked by different armed and masked troopers.

The town was usually quiet on Sunday after sporadic gunfire within the capital all through Saturday between opposing military factions.

“We invite you to proceed your actions and to chorus from any act of violence and vandalism… specifically that in opposition to the French embassy and the French army base”, declared the officer loyal to Traoré, calling for calm .

Damiba himself led a coup earlier this 12 months in opposition to a civilian authorities that had misplaced help within the face of rising violence by Islamist extremists. Damiba’s failure to cease assaults by militant teams had angered the ranks of the armed forces of the previous French protectorate.

The assertion got here after lots of of individuals, some waving Russian flags and supporting Traore’s takeover, gathered to protest exterior the French Embassy on Saturday and Sunday, throwing rocks and burning tires and particles Saturday and early Sunday.

Anti-French protesters additionally gathered and stoned the French Cultural Heart within the southern city of Bobo-Dioulasso. French enterprise pursuits had been additionally vandalized on Sunday morning.

Burkina Faso has turn into the epicenter of assaults by teams linked to al-Qaeda and the Islamic State, after violence that started in neighboring Mali in 2012 unfold to different international locations south of the Sahara desert.

Hundreds of individuals have been killed in raids on rural communities and hundreds of thousands have been compelled to flee regardless of Damiba’s promise to deal with insecurity following his January coup. This week, at the very least 11 troopers died in an assault in northern Burkina Faso. Dozens of civilians are nonetheless lacking following the assault.