Nigeria

29, October 2018

Boko Haram militants attack military base in Nigeria ⁰

Boko Haram militants launched a large assault on a military base in Nigeria’s remote northeast region and killed one soldier, defense officials said Sunday.

The attack on 145 Battalion in Gashigar, Borno State, began on Saturday and continued into early Sunday morning, said Nigerian air force spokesman Ibikunle Daramola.

“BHTs (Boko Haram terrorists) in 13 gun trucks…advanced towards the camp from two different directions,” Daramola said in a statement.

Nigerian troops supported by helicopters “forced the Boko Haram terrorists to retreat from the camp,” Daramola said.

“One soldier was killed in action while four others were wounded,” said the Nigerian army in a statement posted on its official Twitter account.

The army repelled an assault on Gashigar in September by militants in trucks mounted with anti-aircraft guns.

There have been at least nine military base attacks since July, mostly in the northern part of Borno state, near the shores of Lake Chad.

Boko Haram has in recent months intensified attacks on military bases in Borno and nearby Yobe state, undermining repeated claims by the military that they have the upper hand.

Scores of soldiers have been killed, injured or missing in attacks but the military has repeatedly denied or played down losses to the militants.

More than 27,000 people have been killed in northeast Nigeria since the Boko Haram insurgency began in 2009, while nearly two million others remain homeless.

(Source: AFP)

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20, October 2018

Biafra: Missing leader Nnamdi Kanu is in Israel ⁰

The lawyer for a missing pro-Biafran separatist leader on Saturday said he had spoken to his client, after a video and pictures emerged purporting to show him in Jerusalem.

Ifeanyi Ejiofor said he had “received a direct confirmation” about the whereabouts of Nnamdi Kanu, who has not been seen in public since September last year.

“My client is the very person seen in the pictures/video. That I can confirm authoritatively,” he added in a statement.

Kanu, a former London estate agent, heads the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) movement and the outlawed pirate radio station Radio Biafra.

He is facing treason charges and had been on bail at the time troops were deployed to his home city of Umuahia in Abia state, southeast Nigeria, in September 2017.

He then failed to show at his trial in the capital, Abuja, sparking speculation as to his whereabouts.

Ejiofor has previously accused the Nigerian Army of either holding his client incognito or having killed him. The military has denied the charges.

On Friday, a video live-streamed on the Facebook accounts of known associates of Kanu appeared to show him praying at the Western Wall in Jerusalem.

He was dressed in sandals, white trousers, a white Jewish prayer shawl and skull cap.

“This is the supreme leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, the prophet of our time, Nnamdi Kanu, in the Holy City of David,” a voice off camera is heard to say.

Kanu maintains the Igbo people, who are in the majority in southeast Nigeria, are a lost tribe of Israel and it is his mission to lead them to the promised land of Biafra.

A previous unilateral declaration of independence by the Igbo people in 1967 sparked a brutal 30-month civil war that left more than one million dead.

Questions have been raised about how Kanu was able to get to Israel, as he had to surrender his Nigerian and British passports after his arrest.

Others suggested a link to next year’s election, as Kanu has previously called for a boycott of the polls in the southeast.

Peter Obi, the vice-presidential pick for the main opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), comes from the region. The southeast is traditionally a PDP stronghold.

There was no immediate comment from Nigeria’s government, military or security services.

But Kanu’s younger brother, Prince Emmanuel Kanu, told AFP the footage was of his brother and was shot on Friday. He also spoke to him directly and said he was “fine”.

The BBC Igbo language service also quoted one person as saying the man in the video was Kanu and another that he was headed from Jerusalem to Kiev, without elaborating.

Separate photographs of Kanu in Jerusalem do not appear to have been used previously, although it was not possible to extract a date from the images.

There was no immediate response from Facebook when contacted by AFP about the authenticity of the video.

Source: AFP

17, October 2018

Nigeria: Boko Haram kills another female aid worker ⁰

Daesh-linked Boko Haram terrorists in Nigeria have murdered yet another female aid worker, abducted earlier this year in the northeast of the country, a month after they killed one of her colleagues, officials said.

Nigeria’s Information Minister Lai Mohammed announced the latest killing after the expiration of a deadline, noting that the government was “shocked and saddened” by the terrorist act, describing it as “dastardly, inhuman and ungodly,” AFP reported on Tuesday.

It was not clear what the terrorists had requested in return for the potential release of the aid worker. Mohammed did not specifically explain.

Three female health workers were kidnapped by Boko Haram on March 1 during an assault on the remote town of Rann in Borno State that also killed three more aid workers and eight Nigerian troops.

This file photo, grabbed on January 15, 2018 from a video released the same day by the Boko Haram terrorist group, shows at least 14 schoolgirls abducted from the northeastern Nigerian town of Chibok in April 2014. (Via AFP)

Two of the kidnapped women, identified as Hauwa Liman and Saifura Khorsa, worked for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), and the third, named Alice Loksha, worked for the United Nations (UN) Children’s Fund, or UNICEF.

Mohammed did not initially identify the latest victim but noted later in a tweet message that he had “commiserated with the family of Hauwa Liman.”

“It is very unfortunate that it has come to this. Before and after the deadline issued by her abductors, the federal government did everything any responsible government should do to save the aid worker,” he said.

Women are seen sitting amid what remains of a market blown up during an attack on September 20, 2018, in Amarwa, some 20 kilometers from Borno state capital Maiduguri. (Photo by AFP)

There had been no news of the three kidnapped aid workers until last month, when ICRC said it had received footage of Khorsa’s killing from a new faction of the Boko Haram.

The faction threatened to kill Liman and Loksha, as well as a 15-year-old Christian schoolgirl named Leah Sharibu, who was kidnapped from the town of Dapchi, in Yobe State, in February.

Boko Haram terrorists have used abduction as a weapon of war during their militancy in Nigeria, kidnapping thousands of women and girls, and forcing young men and boys to fight in their ranks.

The infamous mass abduction of over 200 schoolgirls from the Borno state town of Chibok by Boko Haram in April 2014 attracted international attention and was widely censured. Nearly 107 of the girls have since been released or escaped from their captors.

Source: Presstv

18, September 2018

100 killed in severe flooding across 10 states in Nigeria ⁰

Nigeria has declared a national disaster after severe flooding left about 100 people dead across 10 states, the country’s main relief agency said on Tuesday.

Heavy seasonal rains have caused the Niger and Benue rivers to burst their banks, inundating communities and farms and trapping tens of thousands of people in their homes.

“We have declared a national disaster in four states — Kogi, Delta, Anambra and Niger. Eight other states are on the watch list. All these states have been the worst hit by the flooding. About 100 people have lost their lives in 10 states,” Sani Datti, from the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), told AFP.

Kogi and Niger are in central Nigeria while Delta and Anambra are in its south.

The Kogi state capital, Lokoja, lies at the confluence of both rivers and has been virtually submerged because of the rising waters.

NEMA said water levels on Monday were continuing to rise in Lokoja and had reached 11.06 meters — approaching those of similar devastating flooding in 2012.

Then, hundreds of people died and about two million others were left homeless in 30 of Nigeria’s 36 states.

More rains are forecast on Tuesday, according to the Nigerian Meteorological Agency.

Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari said on Monday he had approved the release of three billion naira (8.3 million dollars) to buy medical and relief materials.

Flooding along the rivers is a frequent occurrence during the annual rains, which fall from May to September.

Datti said military personnel and equipment had been seconded to help the relief effort, as well as the evacuation of trapped residents from their homes.

(Source: AFP)

11, September 2018

Nigeria: Gas tanker explosion kills at least 35 ⁰

At least 35 people were killed on Monday and hundreds injured when a gas tanker exploded in northern Nigerian state of Nasarawa and started a blaze, the state emergency agency said.

Footage from Nigerian Television Authority NTA shows fire, smoke rising and injured people being carried on stretchers.

The State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) official said the accident happened at a petrol station along the Lafia-Makurdi road linking the capital city of Abuja with northern and southern Nigeria.

Usman Ahmed, acting director at SEMA, said the truck exploded at the point of discharging the gas, citing a witness account. The agency was investigating the incident, he said.

3, September 2018

Nigerian military death toll from Boko Haram attack hits 48!! Buhari won’t talk ⁰

The number of Nigerian soldiers killed in a Boko Haram attack in northeastern Nigeria has reached forty-eight, the AFP news agency reports citing military sources.

The terrorists are said to have overran a military base in the northeast near the border with Niger, two military sources told AFP on Saturday. They are reported to have stormed the base at Zari village in northern Borno state late Thursday and briefly seized it after a fierce battle.

“They came in large numbers in trucks and carrying heavy weapons and engaged soldiers in a battle that lasted for an hour,” a military officer said.

The latest development means the toll has risen by more than half of the initial figure reported. Boko Haram has intensified attacks on military targets in recent months, the army or government has yet to speak on the casualty figures.

“They overwhelmed the troops who were forced to temporarily withdraw before reinforcements arrived,” said the officer who asked not to be named because he was not authorised to speak.

The attacks appear to undermine repeated claims by the military that Boko Haram had been defeated. The militants took weapons and military equipment before they were pushed out of the base by troops with aerial support.

The militants were pursued and bombarded by a fighter jet, said the military sources. “The terrorists also suffered heavy casualty from the bombardment”, one of the military officers said.

Zari is located 30km from the town of Damasak on the border with Niger.

In a statement late Friday the Nigerian military confirmed troops fought Boko Haram “insurgents…on rampage to loot the community and extort money from villagers”.

“Troops…have successfully routed Boko Haram insurgents in an encounter that ensued yesterday evening at Zari village,” the military said in the statement.

It did not speak of military casualties and the raid on the base but maintained “several Boko Haram fighters and weapons” were destroyed in the fight. The Nigerian army has on several occasions disputed reports on losses to Boko Haram and has in some cases played them down.

Source: Africa News

19, August 2018

Boko Haram jihadists kill four farmers in Nigeria ⁰

Four farmers were killed by Boko Haram jihadists outside a key northeast Nigerian city, a militia leader and survivor told AFP on Saturday.

On Friday, around a dozen Boko Haram Islamists riding on motorcycles stormed crop fields near Ali Goshe village, 6km outside the city of Maiduguri, and slit the throats of four farmers.

The attack on civilians comes as the jihadists are launching a surge of assaults against troops in Nigeria, putting the military on the back foot six months before presidential polls.

“So far we have confirmed the death of four people in the attack which happened around midday,” said Ibrahim Liman, who is part of the militia taskforce fighting Boko Haram in the region.

“When the Boko Haram terrorists came the farmers fled but the gunmen managed to grab four and slaughter them.”

Shuaibu Boka, who was among the farmers who escaped, said the jihadists did not shoot in order to avoid attracting the attention of security forces.

“There were dozens of us tending our crops when they came on motorcycles and we all fled in different directions,” Boka said.

“When we returned much later after the gunmen were gone, we found four of our men slaughtered,” he said, adding that the jihadists had killed the 75-year-old head of the community.

Boko Haram’s nine-year quest to establish an Islamic state in Nigeria has killed over 20,000 people and displaced some 2.6 million from their homes, triggering a dire humanitarian crisis in the remote Lake Chad region.

The majority of the displaced people used to be subsistence farmers, but because of the ongoing violence they can no longer tend to their fields and rely on food handouts from aid agencies to survive.

Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said Friday it was providing emergency help after 33 children died of malnutrition, diarrhoea and malaria over the span of two weeks in Bama, a camp housing people displaced by the insurgency.

Agriculture in the region has been decimated by almost a decade of conflict, with locals unable to sow or cultivate crops and jihadists raiding grain stores.

But farmers have been forced to try to resume their work in areas where the military has restored relative peace to help alleviate chronic food shortages.

Boko Haram jihadists have been targeting loggers and peasant farmers, accusing them of spying and passing information to the military and the local militia fighting them.

Source: News 24

15, August 2018

Nigerian soldiers protest as Boko Haram attacks surge ⁰

Disillusioned and exhausted, Nigerian troops battling a surge in Boko Haram jihadist attacks have reached breaking point, protesting less than six months before presidential polls.

The Nigerian army dismissed it as a “misunderstanding”, but on Sunday hundreds of soldiers protested in the airport of Maiduguri, the capital of restive northeast Borno state, for several hours, shooting into the air and disrupting flights.

They were furious about a planned redeployment to a battlefront in the remote Lake Chad region after fighting Boko Haram jihadists for years without relief.

“We should not have been here for more than a year but this is our fourth year and still they are asking us to move to Marte,” one of the protesting soldiers told AFP on condition of anonymity.

“We need some rest, we are war-weary and need to see our families.”

The protest comes after a wave of bloody assaults on military bases in the northeast, forcing the army to retreat and marking a Boko Haram comeback.

The resurgence of violence has put pressure on Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari, who is seeking a second term in office and maintains that the country is now in a “post-conflict stabilisation phase.”

Experts say that Nigeria hasn’t faced such a serious threat from the jihadists since the peak of the insurgency between 2013 and 2015, when Boko Haram controlled swathes of territory in the country’s northeast.

“There has been a military evolution akin to what we’ve seen in Syria and Iraq,” said security analyst Yan St Pierre to AFP.

“Boko Haram’s quality of attack is higher, the level of preparedness is higher.”

The Nigerian military is overwhelmed by the “catastrophic security situation,” said St Pierre, “they are relying on old tactics no longer applicable in the northeast.”

Desperate to stop the onslaught, Nigeria’s military chief Yusuf Tukur Buratai said that “cowardly” soldiers would be punished by death in a July 27 memo seen by AFP.

Soldiers who “abandon their positions” have the potential to “rubbish all the laudable gains made in the operations in the past 3 years against BHT (Boko Haram terrorists).”

– Relentless attacks –

The attacks are relentless. In less than a month, dozens of soldiers have died, though in the absence of any official death toll from the military, the number is feared to be much higher.

Boko Haram has traditionally launched attacks during Nigeria’s rainy season between June and September when roads become water-logged, making it difficult for troops to do patrols.

The more mobile jihadists seize the opportunity to restock their arsenal of weapons from war-torn Libya and Mali through Nigeria’s porous borders.

Sanda Kime, who is part of the militia force fighting against Boko Haram in Lake Chad, said the latest attacks were because of “huge arms supplies” secured by the jihadists.

“They are now better armed which makes them more daring,” said Kime.

The garrison town of Monguno is on high alert after Boko Haram sent out a warning this week that it would attack on August 22 during the Muslim Eid festival, said residents and aid workers.

Similar threats were sent to troops in Askira and Uba towns, security sources said.

On Monday, the United Nations announced the suspension of humanitarian work by its agencies in Monguno from August 19 over security concerns, according to an internal memo seen by AFP.

– Easy hideouts –

Fighters loyal to IS-affiliated Boko Haram factional leader Abu Mus’ab Al-Barnawi are believed to have carried out most of the raids.

The faction is mostly based in the Lake Chad area and in areas south of Maiduguri including Benisheikh and Buni Yadi in nearby Yobe state.

In June, Nigerian fighter jets bombarded Al-Barnawi’s Tumbun Gini enclave in the Lake Chad area, forcing him to flee southwards to a forest near Benisheikh, 80 kilometres south of Maiduguri, according to sources with deep knowledge about the group.

“He moved his operational base to the Benisheikh area from where he planned the attacks on military bases,” said a source who asked not to be named for fear of reprisals.

Al-Barnawi, the son of Boko Haram’s deceased founder Mohammed Yusuf, has found sanctuary in the Lake Chad region, an area fertile in vegetation and fish that is difficult for security forces to penetrate.

“The camps are a reservoir of fighters for the group from where they plan and launch attacks”, said Usman Nalado, a fisherman from the town of Baga on the shore of the lake.

“To end their attacks troops need to smoke them out.”

Source: AFP

18, July 2018

Flooding kills 49 in Nigeria, 20 others missing ⁰

Flooding caused by torrential rains on Nigeria’s border with Niger has left 49 people dead and another 20 missing, the emergency services said on Tuesday.

Five villages in Jibia district were affected after a river burst its banks after hours of heavy rains overnight Sunday, Aminu Waziri, the head of the Katsina state emergency management agency, told AFP.

“We have recovered 49 dead bodies from the five villages and we are still searching for 20 others,” he added.

Twenty-four of the victims were washed away by to Mada Rumfa and Kantumi villages in neighboring Niger.

“Some of the victims were pulled from the rubble of their collapsed homes,” said Waziri.

More than 2,000 people displaced by the flooding were sheltering in primary schools in Jibia, while 27 injured had been taken to hospital.

“The state government has released relief materials for the affected persons and we have also asked for intervention from the national emergency management agency.”

Flooding is common in many parts of Nigeria during the rainy season which runs from May to September.

On Tuesday, local media quoted the meteorological agency as warning of flooding in many parts of the country this year because of “shift in rain pattern,” with some areas recording higher-than-usual rainfall.

In 2012, Nigeria suffered disastrous floods across 30 of its 36 states, in which hundreds of people died and about two million were left homeless.

(Source: AFP)

17, July 2018

Nigeria refutes reports of missing soldiers after Boko Haram ambush ⁰

Nigeria’s military has denied reports that over 20 of its troops are missing, following a clash with Boko Haram militants in the northeast of the country.

The confrontation between militants and troops took place on Saturday in the Bama area of Borno, the state worst hit by the jihadist group which has killed more than 30,000 people since 2009 when it launched an insurgency to create an Islamic caliphate.

Three soldiers told Reuters more than 20 were missing. “We lost some of our soldiers in the attack. It is possible those missing are dead. We haven’t seen about 23 of them now,” said an officer who did not want to be named.

Another soldier involved in the clash said the troops were ambushed while conducting a “clearance operation”, adding that “over 20 soldiers have not been seen up till now”. He said five military vehicles were taken.

The militant group carries out suicide bomb attacks in crowded places, such as markets, as well as gun raids and attacks on military bases.

Nigeria’s army denies its ‘missing soldiers’

At a news conference on Monday, the military said media reports of the soldiers being missing were untrue.

An army spokesman said suspected Boko Haram militants had tried to seize military vehicles in an attempted attack on troops in Bama but they had been repelled by troops backed by the air force.

“About 22 members of Boko Haram terrorists were neutralised while several others escaped with gunshot wounds. Efforts are being intensified by the troops to get the fleeing members of the Boko Haram terrorists,” said a military spokesman.

Boko Haram is ‘technically defeated’

Boko Haram held territory around the size of Belgium in northeast Nigeria for several months until being pushed off much of that land in early 2015 by Nigeria’s army and troops from neighbouring countries.

Bama, about 60 km (40 miles) southeast of Borno’s state capital Maiduguri, was held by Boko Haram from September 2014 until March 2015.

Nigeria’s government has said since December 2015 that Boko Haram has been “technically defeated”. Yet attacks continue in the northeast while another group, an Islamic State ally that split from Boko Haram in 2016, holds territory.

REUTERS