Burkina Faso authorities should urgently investigate and publicly report on the whereabouts of six judges and prosecutors as well as one lawyer who are feared to have been forcibly disappeared, Human Rights Watch said today.
The abductions of the judicial officers and lawyer since October 10, 2025, could amount to enforced disappearances and possible unlawful conscriptions into the armed forces. Their cases, as well as those of four journalists who were detained and later released between October 13 and 18, appear linked to a wave of repression by the Burkinabè military junta against the judiciary and the media.
"Burkina Faso's human rights situation has become increasingly defined by abductions, arbitrary arrests, enforced disappearances, and unlawful conscriptions of junta critics and activists," said Ilaria Allegrozzi, senior Sahel researcher at Human Rights Watch. "The military junta should urgently locate and report on the seven missing people and release them if they have not been credibly charged with an offense."
Several media and knowledgeable sources consulted by Human Rights Watch reported that between October 10 and 15, men in civilian clothes abducted the judicial officers, Urbain Meda, Seydou Sanou, Benoit Zoungrana, Moussa Dianda, and Alban Somé, from their homes in the capital, Ougadougou. On October 13, Arnaud Sempebré, a lawyer, was also reported missing.
Meda, Sanou, Zoungrana, and Dianda all worked at the Ouagadougou Court of Appeal, while Somé worked at the first instance court in Ouagadougou.
All of the judicial officers and the lawyer had been involved in a three-year case in which traders and customs officers had been charged with smuggling fuel to Islamist armed groups. A colleague of the judicial officers and other local sources said the abductions followed a July ruling by the Ouagadougou Court of Appeal that confirmed the first instance court's verdict not to proceed with a criminal case. Sempebré, the lawyer, was representing those acquitted in the case.
The Burkinabè bar association stated on October 20 that it officially requested information about Sempebré's whereabouts, to no avail, and had called for his immediate release.
Media and social media reported that unidentified men on October 20 abducted Jean-Jacques Wendpanga Ouedraogo, a former attorney general of the Ouagadougou Court of Appeal. Social media sources said he was released the following day. Human Rights Watch was unable to independently verify this information. In August 2023, Ouedraogo ordered into custody Amsétou Nikiéma, known as Adja, a traditional healer reportedly close to the military, who had been charged with assault and battery, among other offenses.
A member of the Burkinabè judiciary expressed concern that those abducted were being punished for the ruling in the smuggling case. "For three years, members of the notorious intelligence services have been abducting critics with impunity," he said.
The junta has previously targeted judicial officers, Human Rights Watch said. In a July 2024 speech, the junta leader, Ibrahim Traoré, sharply criticized the justice sector, attacking judges and prosecutors whom he called "corrupt," "crooks," and "sellouts," and condemned justice-sector unions that had publicly opposed a change in the judiciary's Superior Council.
The change, initiated in 2023, grants the council the authority to appoint prosecutors but only on recommendations from the justice minister. The unions had opposed this change, saying that it would undermine the independence of the judiciary and place prosecutors under executive influence.
"We have a serious problem [with the justice sector]," Traoré said. "We have initiated reforms … some tried to boycott … but … we will go ahead with or without them. The battle [against the judicial officers] will be launched."
In August 2024, the junta unlawfully conscripted into military service seven judges and prosecutors, misusing a 2023 emergency law. At that time, a coalition of three justice system unions reacted with a statement and condemned the requisitions as "acts of humiliation and intimidation of judicial officers."
Since the October 2022 military coup, Burkina Faso's junta has increasingly cracked down on peaceful dissent, political opposition, and the media, shrinking the civic space in the country. Security forces have arbitrarily arrested, detained, forcibly disappeared, and unlawfully conscripted dozens of journalists. Some of them have been released, while others remain missing, such as the investigative journalist Serge Oulon.
Local and international media and nongovernmental organizations reported that between October 13 and 16, members of the intelligence services detained Michel Wendpouiré Nana, deputy editor of the newspaper Le Pays; Ousséni Ilboudo and Alain Zongo, the editor and publisher of the newspaper l'Observateur Paalga, respectively; and Zowenmanogo Dieudonné Zoungrana, director of the newspaper Aujourd'hui au Faso.
The authorities released them between October 14 and 18. The reasons for their arrests were not revealed. In late September, Zoungrana took part in an interview with Traoré. A Burkinabè activist shared the interview transcript on social media before it was aired by national television, raising concerns that Zoungrana was detained because the interview had been leaked.
Burkina Faso is a party to the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance. Enforced disappearances are defined under international law as the arrest or detention of a person by state officials or their agents followed by a refusal to acknowledge the deprivation of liberty, or to reveal the person's fate or whereabouts.
"Independent courts and a free media are essential checks on the government's power," Allegrozzi said. "Burkina Faso authorities need to immediately halt any interference in the judiciary, ensure that judges and prosecutors can carry out their duties without fear, and stop the harassment of journalists and media outlets."
