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Nigerian troops have freed more than 800 people held hostage by Boko Haram across the country’s north-east, the army said.
The “clearance operation” on Tuesday saw 520 people rescued in Kusumma village, three Boko Haram fighters killed and one fighter from the group captured alive, according to spokesman Colonel Sani Kukasheka Usman.
In a statement posted to the army’s official website on Thursday, he said that 309 others were rescued in 11 villages acorss the region.
At least 22 “terrorists” were said to have been killed in the operation in which 309 were rescued.
Boko Haram has not commented on the statement.
“The gallant troops cleared the remnants of the Boko Haram terrorists hibernating in Kala Balge general area,” Usman said. Kala Balge is a local government area of Borno State.
In a recent interview, Nigeria’s Information Minister Lai Mohammed said that the army had significantly reduced Boko Haram’s ability to carry out big attacks.
“The Boko Haram insurgency has been massively decimated to the extent that it’s no longer in the position to carry out spectacular attacks,” he said.
Earlier in March, two female bombers killed at least 22 worshippers in an attack on a mosque. The attack took place on the outskirts of the northeastern city of Maiduguri — the birthplace of the Boko Haram armed group.
The group was suspected of having carried out the attack, according to Colonel Usman.
Boko Haram has increasingly used suicide and bomb attacks as Nigeria’s military pushes the group out of territories they once controlled. Several bombers have blown themselves up in recent months at roadblocks into the city manned by the military and vigilantes.
The US military calls Boko Haram the most violent armed group in the world.
Some 20,000 people have been killed and about 2,3 million displaced by its war with the government since 2009.
Meanwhile, Boko Haram gunmen have abducted 16 women in a remote area of northeast Nigeria’s Adamawa state, police, a lawmaker and locals said on Thursday. “We received report of the kidnap of 14 women and two girls by gunmen believed to be Boko Haram insurgents near Sabon Garin Madagali village”, said Adamawa state police spokesperson Othman Abubakar.
“We’ve sent search teams to the area and have notified the military who have also deployed personnel for search and rescue operation in the bush to free the hostages.”
Adamu Kamale, who represents the area in Nigeria’s lower chamber of parliament, the House of Representatives, also confirmed the abduction, which happened on Wednesday.
Locals said the hostages were seized in the bush while fetching firewood and fishing in a nearby river under the escort of two civilian vigilantes assisting the military against the Islamist insurgents.
“When the civilian vigilantes escorting the women saw the heavily armed Boko Haram fighters advancing on them they fled, leaving the women to their fate,” said Madagali resident Garba Barnabas.
Two women who escaped by jumping into the river and pretending to have drowned later returned to the village to raise the alarm, he added.
Madagali district, which lies on the border with Borno state, has been repeatedly attacked by Boko Haram during its nearly seven-year insurgency, which has left more than 17,000 people dead.
Human rights groups have said fighters have kidnapped thousands of women and young girls, including more than 200 schoolgirls who were abducted from the Borno town of Chibok nearly two years ago.
The insurgents temporarily seized Madagali district and parts of Adamawa as well as large swathes of territory in Borno and Yobe state in 2014, as they sought to establish a hardline Islamic state.
More than 2.6 million people have fled their homes since the start of the violence but as troops began a fight-back last year and recaptured territory, some of the internally displaced have returned home.
Sporadic hit-and-run attacks have continued however, as well as suicide bombings.
“Since people returned to their homes we have been experiencing attacks by Boko Haram despite claims that security has been restored”, said Kamale.
“The abduction shows that more security needs to be deployed to protect the people from attacks and abductions.” — AFP
derick.khumalo