The unidentified assailants struck during the day and into the evening, ransacking and burning six villages in the Bandiagara area, the sources said on Saturday, speaking on condition of anonymity.

One of the sources said the assailants had come in large numbers on motorcycles and attacked a first village, where they killed everyone and destroyed everything.

There was no immediate comment from the ruling military junta.

The West African nation is battling armed groups with links to al Qaeda and Islamic State, which took root in its arid north following a Tuareg separatist rebellion in 2012.

Militants have since spread to other countries in the Sahel region south of the Sahara, seizing territory, killing thousands of people and uprooting millions in the process.

--Reuters--