A weekend attack killed six Beninese soldiers with the army having “neutralised” 17 unnamed assailants in response, a military source said on Monday.

Observers are increasingly worried about violence in neighbouring Niger and Burkina Faso, both battling long-entrenched jihadist insurgencies, spilling into the coastal west African country.

“We lost six men and we neutralised 17,” a senior army official told AFP, adding that the military was “combing the W National Park” in response.

The Saturday afternoon attack took place in the Beninese town of Karimama, located in the nature reserve which extends across the porous Niger and Burkina Faso borders.

Attacks in northern Benin have increased in recent years with authorities blaming members of the Islamic State group and Al-Qaeda-linked jihadists based across the border.

A diplomatic source told AFP last month that 121 Beninese military personnel had been killed between 2021 and December 2024.

“The more the situation in Niger and Burkina Faso deteriorates, the harder it gets for Benin,” the source added.

In January, an attack in the Pendjari National Park near the borders of Niger and Burkina Faso killed 28 Beninese soldiers.

The incident was later claimed by the Al-Qaeda-linked Group to Support Islam and Muslims (JNIM).

Gunmen in December killed three soldiers and wounded four others who were guarding an oil pipeline in northeast Benin.

Benin in January 2022 deployed nearly 3,000 troops to secure its borders as part of Operation Mirador.

The country’s authorities also recruited 5,000 additional personnel to reinforce security in the north.

Last week, Benin’s defence ministry announced new measures for soldiers’ “psychological support”.

“It’s our collective responsibility to offer them the necessary resources so that they can pursue their mission in the best conditions possible, in total safety, both physically and psychologically,” said Colonel-Major Mathias Alizannon.

A Delta Air Lines (DAL.N) regional jet flipped upside down upon landing at Canada’s Toronto Pearson Airport on Monday amid windy weather following a snowstorm, injuring 18 of the 80 people on board, officials said.

Three people on the flight that originated at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport suffered critical injuries, among them a child, authorities added.

U.S. carrier Delta said a CRJ900 aircraft operated by its Endeavor Air subsidiary was involved in a single-aircraft accident with 76 passengers and four crew members on board. The 16-year-old CRJ900, made by Canada’s Bombardier (BBDb.TO)

Canadian authorities said they would investigate the cause of the crash, which was not yet known.

Passenger John Nelson posted a video of the aftermath on Facebook, showing a fire engine spraying water on the plane that was lying belly-up on the snow-covered tarmac.

He later told CNN there was no indication of anything unusual before landing.

“We hit the ground, and we were sideways, and then we were upside down,” Nelson told the television network.
“I was able to just unbuckle and sort of fall and push myself to the ground. And then some people were kind of hanging and needed some help being helped down, and others were able to get down on their own,” he said.

Pearson Airport said earlier on Monday it was dealing with high winds and frigid temperatures as airlines attempted to catch up with missed flights after a weekend snowstorm dumped more than 22 cm (8.6 inches) of snow at the airport.

The Delta plane touched down in Toronto at 2:13 p.m. (1913 GMT) after an 86-minute flight and came to rest near the intersection of runway 23 and runway 15, according to flight tracking website FlightRadar24.

“The aircraft is upside down and burning,” an emergency worker told the air traffic control tower after a controller noted that some passengers were walking near the crashed plane, according to a recording of the incident posted on liveatc.net.

Deborah Flint, president of the Toronto airport, attributed to the absence of fatalities in part to the work of first responders at the airport.

“We are very grateful that there is no loss of life and relatively minor injuries,” she said at a press conference.

Michael J. McCormick, associate professor of air traffic management at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, said the upside-down position made the crash fairly unique.

“But the fact that 80 people survived an event like this is a testament to the engineering and the technology, the regulatory background that would go into creating a system where somebody can actually survive something that not too long ago would have been fatal,” he said.

All 18 of the people injured were passengers and were taken to area hospitals, Delta said in a statement.

Of those injured, two were airlifted to trauma centers, and a child was transported to a children’s hospital, said Supervisor Lawrence Saindon of Peel Regional Paramedic Services.

The Toronto airport was shut down for more than two hours before departures and arrivals resumed. This led to ground delays and diversions to other airports including Montreal-Trudeau International Airport, which said it was preparing to receive several diverted flights that might cause further delays.

Flint said on Monday evening there would be some operational impact and delays at Toronto airport over the next few days while two runways remained closed for the investigation.

The Transportation Safety Board of Canada (TSB) said it was deploying a team of investigators, and the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board said a team of investigators would assist Canada’s TSB.

Japan’s Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (7011.T), which closed a deal to buy the CRJ aircraft program from Bombardier in 2020, said it was aware of the incident and would fully cooperate with the investigation.

The crash in Canada followed other recent crashes in North America. An Army helicopter collided with a CRJ-700 passenger jet in Washington, killing 67 people, while at least seven people died when a medical transport plane crashed in Philadelphia and 10 were killed in a passenger plane crash in Alaska.

A 14-year-old boy has been killed and five people wounded in a knife attack in southern Austria.

Police said the suspect is a 23-year-old Syrian asylum seeker who was detained at the scene in Villach, a town near the border with Italy and Slovenia.

Police are yet to establish a motive but have involved extremism specialists in the investigation, a spokesman told BBC News.

The incident took place around 16:00 local time (15:00 GMT) near the town’s main square. Two of the five people injured were in a serious condition as of Saturday evening.

A delivery worker who had driven his vehicle at the attacker helped prevent more injuries, police said.

The driver – also a Syrian man – said he witnessed the attack as he was driving by and deliberately rammed the knifeman.

The suspect was arrested shortly after by two female police officers. As of Saturday evening, he was still being interrogated, police said.

Some witness reports initially indicated a potential second attacker, leading to police shutting down train travel in the attack’s immediate aftermath.

However, local police told BBC News they were confident only one knifeman was involved.

Austrian law means the attacker’s identity has not been released but police confirmed he is a 23-year-old Syrian man who lived locally.

He had a temporary residence permit and was waiting for a decision on his asylum application.

Police initially said four people were wounded but a fifth person later came forward with minor injuries.

The identity of the teenager who was killed has also not yet been disclosed.

The attack comes amid national debates over asylum laws and a political crisis following an election last year which saw the far-right Freedom Party come out on top for the first time.

However it has failed to form a coalition government, leaving Austria’s President Alexander Van der Bellen weighing up whether to call a snap election, form a minority government, or invite other parties or a group of experts to try and form an administration.

Herbet Kickl, the head of the Freedom Party, seized on the Villach attack, saying in a statement that Austria needs a “rigorous crackdown on asylum”.

Peter Kaiser of the centre-left Social Democratic Party – who is the governor of Carinthia, the region where Villach is located – described the attack as an “unimaginable atrocity”.

He said the stabbings should not lead to “hateful” reactions while urging the government and European Union to tighten asylum policy.

Credit: BBC News