ON the evening of 31 December, as the hours ticked down to the New Year, 40-year-old Aguiratou Diallo was at home with her four children in their village near the town of Koumbri in northern Burkina Faso, when a group of armed men burst into the courtyard outside.  "They threatened to hurt us if we were still there when they returned the next day. Then they fired into the air to scare us," said Aguiratou, whose husband was away at work at the time. "I was so frightened. The whole family – including my grandmother, aunt, and my husband's brothers…