Armed men have cut off the left ears of 16 villagers harvesting cashew nuts in Senegal's rebel-hit Casamance region.
"They tied our hands before cutting off one ear each," Lansana Manga, 31, told the AFP news agency.
This is the first case of such deliberate mutilation during the region's 26 years of conflict.
The government has signed peace deals with most rebel factions but some have turned to robbery. Cashew nuts are one of the area's main cash crops.
Mr Manga said they were harvesting the nuts in Niaguis, 20km from the regional capital, Ziguinchor, when they were approached by men dressed in military fatigues and armed with UN food body 'should be scrapped' ...
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"We told them they did not have to do that but they said it was to punish us because we were in their territory," he said.
The cashew-nut harvest time has regularly seen as upsurge in violence and armed attacks.
The Gambia lies between Casamance and the rest of Senegal and the MFDC rebels started a war for independence in 1982.
A peace deal was signed in 2004 but the armed robbery remains common in the area, badly hitting its once vibrant tourist industry.
(BBC)
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