Jihadist-hit Niger final week killed about 30 members of the Boko Haram group and detained 960 followers, most of them ladies and youngsters, who had fled neighbouring Nigeria, official sources mentioned.
State TV channel Tele Sahel mentioned late Tuesday that on March 7 aerial surveillance noticed a “large motion of individuals” alongside the Kamadougou Yoge River, which marks the border between the 2 nations, who had been heading in direction of Lke Chad.
The report mentioned they had been members of the Boko Haram jihadist group, who had been fleeing their hideout in Sambisa forest in northeast Nigeria after coming underneath stress from their rivals, the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP).
ISWAP cut up from Boko Haram in 2016 and rose to grow to be the dominant group within the area’s long-running jihadist turmoil.
It seized swathes of territory underneath Boko Haram management after chief Abubakar Shekau was killed in clashes with ISWAP in Might 2021.
In search of to stop the group from reaching Lake Chad and utilizing its marshlands as a haven, the military tried to barter a give up, utilizing envoys and dropping leaflets, however ultimately launched a daybreak assault on March 11, Tele Sahel mentioned.
“Round 30 terrorists had been neutralised” and 960 different individuals, most of whom had been ladies and youngsters, had been detained, taken to the city of Diffa and handed over to the Nigerian navy authorities, it mentioned.
An elected official in Toumour, a village close to the city of Bosso bordering Lake Chad, confirmed Wednesday that “numerous Boko Haram” fleeing Sambisa had been intercepted on Niger’s border “and handed over to the Nigerian authorities.”
One other official mentioned that many others, nevertheless, “are heading in direction of (the islands) on the lake, particularly ladies and youngsters, in horrible circumstances.”
One of many poorest nations on the planet, Niger is being assailed by two jihadist insurgencies.
One, within the southwest, got here from neighbouring Mali in 2015, whereas the opposite, within the southeast, is a long-running spillover from Boko Haram’s marketing campaign in Nigeria.
The group’s violence has killed over 40,000 individuals and displaced round two million from their properties since 2009, in keeping with the United Nations.
The huge Lake Chad area, shared by Nigeria, Niger, Cameroon and Chad, is a infamous bolthole for each Boko Haram and ISWAP, who arrange camps on islands in its marshlands.
The 4 nations arrange a Multinational Joint Activity Drive in 2015, comprising 8,500, with the purpose of defeating the armed teams.
