Twin attacks on the French embassy in Burkina Faso and the country's military headquarters Friday left dozens dead or wounded, security sources said.
The apparently coordinated attacks underlined the struggle the fragile West African nation faces in containing a bloody and growing jihadist insurgency, reports Yahoo! News.
The government said the attack on the military was a suicide car bombing, adding that a regional anti-terrorism meeting may have been the target.
Eight members of the armed forces were killed by the blast and the parallel attack on the French embassy, while 80 were wounded, said Security Minister Clement Sawadogo. The minister said eight attackers had been shot dead.
"The vehicle was packed with explosives" and caused "huge damage", Sawadogo said, adding that it was a "suicide" attack.
Three security sources, two in France and one in West Africa, told AFP that at least 28 people were killed in the attack on the military HQ alone.
"Our country was once again the target of dark forces," President Roch Marc Christian Kabore said in a statement.
The violence began mid-morning when heavy gunfire broke out in the centre of the Burkinabe capital Ouagadougou.
Witnesses said five armed men got out of a car and opened fire on passersby before heading towards the French embassy.
At the same time, the bomb went off near the headquarters of the Burkinabe armed forces and the French cultural centre, about a kilometre (half a mile) from the site of the first attack, other witnesses said.