The shots were heard from around 12:45 am (0045 GMT) in the heart of the city, 10 months after a coup, the second in less than a year in the West African country that is facing jihadist violence.

It was not immediately known what prompted the shooting.

Captain Ibrahim Traore seized power in Burkina Faso in a September 30, 2022, coup which ousted Lieutenant-Colonel Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba, who in January that year had toppled the country's last elected president, Roch Marc Christian Kabore.

The motive for both coups was anger at failures to stem a jihadist insurgency that has claimed thousands of lives since spilling over from neighbouring Mali in 2015.

But each putsch has hit the country's ability to fight effectively against the jihadists, who are affiliated with Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group.

More than 16,000 civilians, troops and police have died in the increased jihadist attacks, according to an NGO count, including more than 5,000 since the start of this year.

More than two million people have also been displaced within their country, making it one of the worst internal displacement crises in Africa.