Malian authorities have detained five people suspected of participating in the massacre of at least 157 villagers, a prosecutor said on Friday, following one of the worst attacks in Africa's Sahel region in living memory.

The March 23 raid by suspected hunters from the Dogon community on Ogossagou, a village in central Mali populated by rival Fulani herders, was part of a wider surge in ethnic and jihadist violence across the West Africa country and neighboring Burkina Faso and Niger.

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Prosecution for violent acts related to conflict in the Sahel region is rare, and widespread impunity is among the reasons communities take it upon themselves to exact revenge in tit-for-tat killings.

"Among the wounded taken care of by the medical service, five were formally recognized by others who had been wounded as being among the assailants," said Aza Ould Mohamed Nazim, a prosecutor in the Mopti region.

He said the five had been transported to the capital Bamako and placed under guard.

The United Nations dispatched experts to the area this week to investigate the killings, and the International Criminal Court also said the crimes could fall under its jurisdiction.

(Cover: A soldier walks amid the damage after an attack by gunmen on Fulani herders in Ogossagou, Mali, March 25, 2019. /VCG Photo)