A French soldier has died in Burkina Faso, France’s armed forces ministry said in a statement on Monday.
Sergeant Morgan Henry was found dead in his camp on Sunday, the ministry said, adding that the cause of death was so far unknown and that an investigation was underway.
Henry served in Burkina Faso as part of Operation Barkhane, a French anti-insurgency mission in the Sahel region launched in 2014 after France’s intervention in Mali, where French troops helped push back jihadists that had taken over the country’s north.
Some 4,500 soldiers are stationed in five former French colonies — Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger — as part of the operation. President Emmanuel Macron announced last month that France would send an additional 220 soldiers to the region.
Despite the French deployment, the security situation in Burkina Faso has deteriorated. On Sunday, gunmen killed 24 people in an attack on a church in the country’s north.