#News - Army Frees 182 Boko Haram Suspects

The Nigerian army has released 182 Boko Haram suspects after investigations by the military proved they had no link to the insurgency group. Handing the men, women, underaged boys and children over to the Borno state governor Alhaji Kashim Shettima at a military base in Maiduguri yesterday July 6th,the Chief of Army staff, Lt. Gen. Kenneth Minimah said the suspects have been acquitted.

“We have over 100 detainees who were
suspected to have link with Boko Haram.

They are 100 men, 24 women, 40 underage boys and 18 children. They have been cleared, we have decided to hand them over to the Borno State government. They’ve been thoroughly investigated and acquitted of any involvement in the activities of Boko Haram or connected with the group” The Borno state governor expressed gratitude to God for exonerating the suspects and pledged the state government’s support to them as they rebuild their lives.

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Boko Haram attack on Maiduguri kills 20

Maiduguri — Boko Haram once again attacked Maiduguri on Tuesday,
waking residents with deafening explosions in the early hours of the morning and then a suicide bombing that witnesses said killed as many as 20 people.

The extremist group, which seeks to impose Islamic law across northern Nigeria, has repeatedly attacked Maiduguri since President Muhammadu Buhari has designated it as the new headquarters in the war to curb the Islamic uprising.

"We are under siege," Sumaila Ayuba, her voice shaking, told The Associated Press by telephone just after midnight from her home on the city's western flank after her sleep was shattered by the explosions. "The shooting is quite deafening. Please, we need prayers."

Hours later, a man blew himself up at Gamboru cattle market, the site of previous bombings, officials said. One witness said he counted at least 20 bodies. The National Emergency Management Agency said 10 people were killed and many others injured. The witness spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.

Some onlookers began stoning the agency's rescue workers, for unknown reasons. Soldiers fired into the air to disperse the crowd. Over the weekend, more than 30 people died in another Boko Haram assault involving another suicide bombing and rocket-propelled grenades.

Also Tuesday, Boko Haram released a new video that allegedly shows militants shooting wounded Nigerian soldiers in the head and beheading a man in civilian clothes as well as charred parts claimed to be the remnants of a downed Nigerian jet fighter.

The video, the first released since it pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, has no sign of longtime leader Abubakar Shekau, previously a mainstay of the group's videos.

There was no explanation for his absence. Nigeria's military has claimed many times to have killed Shekau — only to have him later resurface.

In Tuesday's video, an armed fighter said Boko Haram still holds several northeastern towns and has thousands of fighters — claims impossible to substantiate.

The video gloats over alleged disunity in the multinational force that in March announced it had driven Boko Haram from all towns and villages. Nigerian neighbors Chad and Niger have said the fight against Boko Haram would be long over if they had better cooperation from Nigeria.

President Muhammadu Buhari is traveling to Chad and Niger on Wednesday on his first official trip outside Nigeria, spokesman Garba Shehu said.

The chief of naval staff, Vice Admiral Usman Jibril, said the military chiefs briefed Buhari on the security situation, especially the fight against Boko Haram, and received a presidential directive to move the military headquarters for the fight against the insurgents to Maiduguri.

The uprising has killed some 13,000 people and driven 1.5 million from their homes.

- AP

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Purported pic of Boko Haram members killed in Biu today

Biu town in Borno state was attacked by
members of Boko Haram this morning.

Fortunately, the military was able to repel the
attack and kill/arrest many militants. I just got a
gruesome pic after the cut supposedly from a
military officer at the scene in Borno which
purportedly shows members of Boko Haram
killed during the attack earlier today.

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2,000 Slaughtered In Alleged Boko Haram Deadliest Massacre In Northern Nigeria

More than two thousand bodies remain strewn in the bush in Northern Nigeria from a recent Islamic extremist attack which according to Amnesty International, it is regarded as the “deadliest massacre” in the history of Boko Haram.

Government spokesman on Insurgency, Mike Omeri disclosed that incessant onslaught ensued on Friday in Baga, a town on the border with Chad where insurgents seized a key military base on Jan. 3 and attacked again on Wednesday.

“Security forces have responded rapidly, and have deployed significant military assets and conducted airstrikes against militant targets,” Omeri said in a statement.

District head Baba Abba Hassan said most victims are children, women and elderly people who could not run fast enough when insurgents drove into Baga, firing rocket-propelled grenades and assault rifles on town residents.

“The human carnage perpetrated by Boko Haram terrorists in Baga was enormous,” Muhammad Abba Gava, a spokesman for poorly armed civilians in a defense group that fights Boko Haram, told reporters.

He said the civilian fighters gave up on trying to count all the bodies. “No one could attend to the corpses and even the seriously injured ones who may have died by now,” Gava said.

According to Amnesty International, there are reports the town was razed and as many as 2,000 people killed.

If true, “this marks a disturbing and bloody escalation of Boko Haram’s ongoing onslaught,” said Daniel Eyre, Nigeria researcher for Amnesty International.

The previous bloodiest day in the uprising involved soldiers gunning down unarmed detainees freed in a March 14, 2014, attack on Giwa military barracks in Maiduguri city. Amnesty said then that satellite imagery indicated more than 600 people were killed that day.

Source : 360nobs.com

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'I Don’t Know how 2 Military Grenades Got into My Bag' – Girl Suspect

A 16-year-old female student of Federal
Government Girls College (FGGC), Jalingo,
Blessing Ellan and her father who were arrested
on Monday while trying to enter the school
premises with two military hand grenades said
she did not know how the grenades got into her
bag.

Ellan, who stated this yesterday in Jalingo while
answering questions from journalists at the
state police command, said the day she went to
the market to buy her provisions, she bought
gari and kept
it with her customer to enable her go and buy
other things that she would need in school, and
when she brought them home, she arranged
them in her bag.

“There was nothing that looked like military
grenades when I was arranging those
things I bought in my bag,” she said.
She stated that even when she left her house to
the park, there was nothing like that in her bag,
adding that it was when they got to Maraban
Zing where their driver dropped some
passengers that her father went to the back to
monitor her bag and discovered that the bag
had been unzipped.

“When my father saw that my bag was
open, he asked if I was the one who
opened the bag; I told him no and he just
zipped it and we all proceeded to Jalingo”.

She said it was when she brought her bag for a
search at the school gate that the security men
discovered the two hand grenades in the bag.
“Although, when our driver was dropping
passengers at Mararaban Zing, I saw four
men at the back of the vehicle we entered.

But I do not know what they were doing at
the back of our car”, she stressed.
She said she has nothing to do with Boko
Haram and nothing in common with the

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Girl: My father gave me to Boko Haram

Kano - A 13-year-old girl says her father gave her to Boko Haram
extremists and that she was arrested after refusing to explode a
suicide bomb at a market in Kano, Nigeria's second largest city in the
north.

She says she told her captors she did not want to be a suicide bomber
but allowed them to strap her into a vest primed with explosives
because they threatened to bury her alive.

She says she was taken to Kano's textile market where two other
girls detonated their bombs. Police said four people were killed in the
10 December attack.

Police presented the girl at a news conference on Tuesday night.
Nigeria has suffered numerous bombings carried out by girls and
young women.

- AP

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185 women and children reportedly abducted in Borno state

According to a CNN breaking news, 185 women and children were kidnapped by Boko Haram men during a raid on Gumsuri village 20km from Chibok in Borno state on Sunday December 14th. Men were shot, homes were burnt and women taken away. This is the largest rounding up of women and children since the abduction of Chibok girls in April 2014.

32 people including the Chief Imam of the village were killed. Leaders of the opposition vigilante were also killed. Word of the attack was slow to emerge due to the destruction of telecoms towers in the community. Nigerian military are yet to react to this latest attack. But how do these terrorists take 185 people away? They come with many vehicles?

Source : Linda ikeji blog

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Breaking News: Boko Haram Attack Two Villages In Adamawa

Less than 24 hours after some hunters and civilian
vigilantes reportedly ousted Boko Haram fighters from
Mubi town in Adamawa State, latest reports say the
insurgents invaded two other towns in the state.

According to AFP report, the home of a retired military
general was also attacked where the militants raised their
black flag outside the home.

It was gathered that Islamist militants raided Hong and Gombi,
some 100 kilometres (62.5 miles) from the state capital, Yola,
after they were pushed out of the commercial hub of Mubi,
which they seized two weeks ago.
Prior to this latest attack, the terrorists were believed to have
captured more than two dozen towns in Yobe, Borno and
Adamawa states in recent months.

But despite apparently losing control of Mubi, which the
Islamists renamed Madinatul Islam or “City of Islam” in
Arabic, the invasion of Hong and Gombi saw them move closer
to Yola.

Thousands of residents have been taking refuge in Yola from
the terror attacks going on in Adamawa.
Speaking on the development, a resident of Gombi, Haruna
Awwalu, informed that Boko Haram insurgents were
patrolling the streets, firing heavy weaponry.

Another resident, Rabi Tanimu, said people were cowering
indoors and many had fled into the bush.
“They have burnt down the police station, the local
government secretariat and the market after overpowering the
police, ” Awwalu said.
It was gathered that a police station was razed in Hong, 20
kilometres away from Gombi.

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Breaking News: Scores killed as Boko Haram attack Chibok again

Boko Haram reportedly launched an attack on Chibok
community in Borno state yesterday night November 14th
killing several people.

Some residents of the village who spoke with Sahara Reporters
said that the sect members shot several people dead and
injured many before heading to the village square to
announce that they have taking over the town as one of their
caliphates.

Source : gurusloaded.com

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Boko Haram said to seize another town in Borno State

Niamey - Extremist group Boko Haram has seized control of a town
near the Niger border, leading soldiers to flee and adding to its
expanding reach in the region, an official said Saturday.

The insurgents were said to have taken control of Malam Fatori in
Borno state after fighting on Wednesday and Thursday, a senior
official in the Niger town of Diffa near Nigeria told AFP on condition
of anonymity.

The fighting killed dozens and wounded about 30 people in the a
commercial hub known for fishing and farming, the Anfani radio
station in Diffa reported.

"The town of Malam Fatori was taken by Boko Haram after violent
fighting with the Nigerian army overnight Wednesday to Thursday,"
said the official in Diffa, where thousands of refugees from the
conflict have fled to.

According to the official, 315 Nigerian soldiers fled over the border to
Diffa. Thirteen who were wounded were treated in a Diffa hospital,
while the others have been repatriated.

The official's version of events differed from the one given by a
Nigerian senator, who on Thursday spoke of the attack but did not
say that the town had been taken.

Senator Maina Maaji Lawan said the insurgents met stiff resistance
from soldiers from a multi-national task force in the region that
includes troops from Nigeria, Chad and Niger.

Lawan however also said that soldiers were later forced to flee after
being overpowered by the insurgents. He said that 21 civilians were
killed.

Boko Haram has killed thousands in its five-year insurgency in
Nigeria, and it has in recent months taken control of a growing
number of areas in the country's northeast.
It has occasionally carried out cross-border attacks, and another
such raid occurred on Saturday in Cameroon.

In that attack, Boko Haram members attacked a Cameroon border
town, leading to six hours of fighting that killed a soldier and several
insurgents, authorities said.

The attack occurred in Kerawa, near areas of Nigeria recently taken
over by Boko Haram. The nearby Mandara mountains have been used
as a hideout by Boko Haram members.
"Boko Haram attacked Kerawa around 4:00 am (0300 GMT)," a police
officer in the region said on condition of anonymity.

"A man from the BIR (elite army unit) was killed. Several assailants
were also killed."
He said gun battles between the extremists and soldiers rocked the
area until around 10:00 am.

Cameroon has reinforced its military presence in the region in a bid to
stop an escalation in attacks by Boko Haram. On October 17, the
military claimed to have killed 107 Islamists during intense fighting
that also left eight soldiers dead.

Ten Chinese and 17 local hostages were kidnapped earlier this year in
Cameroon in raids blamed on Boko Haram. They were released last
month.

- AFP

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Military clears and releases 125 'Boko Haram detainees'

Maiduguri - The military on Saturday released 125 people it said were
arrested in an operation against Boko Haram but were later found to
not be part of the group.
The latest release came two days after 42 others were set free in
similar circumstances.

Throughout Boko Haram's five-year uprising, the security services
have been criticised for carrying out mass arrests and holding alleged
Islamist rebels indefinitely with little or no evidence.

Rights groups have pressured Nigeria to either charge in court or
release the suspected militants it has in custody.

Northeast army spokesman Sani Usman told journalists the 125
individuals were picked up on September 23 in the town of Biu in Borno
state, Boko Haram's stronghold.

A total of 254 people "were intercepted" in the military operation, and
"quite a number were confirmed to be hardcore members of the
terrorist group," he said.
"However, the 125 people in front of you today were found to have no
link whatsoever with" Boko Haram, Usman told journalists in Borno's
capital Maiduguri.

Among those released was Ibrahim Umar who said he was driving a
truck loaded with sheep on the outskirts of Biu when the military
pulled him over and detained him.

"I am sure my family would be shocked to see me alive because nobody
ever saw me since the day I was arrested," he said.
Borno's Governor Kashim Shettima said the decision to release those
found to be innocent "bolstered" the "image of the army."

Speaking following the release of the 42 people on Thursday, Shettima
said that group would receive 100,000 naira ($600, 480 euros) "to
enable them to start a new life."
He also directed state officials to help them find jobs.

It was not clear if the 125 detainees released Saturday would be
given the same benefits.
The military's release of apparently innocent civilians caught up in
operations against Boko Haram may be welcomed by rights groups who
have condemned indiscriminate detentions.
But Nigeria's security services were again this week accused of major
abuses.

Sixteen people in the northeast town of Potiskum were dropped at a
morgue with bullet holes in their bodies after having been arrested by
soldiers

Local leaders called for an immediate investigation and some described
the deaths as "cold-blooded murder."

Meanwhile, Boko Haram attacks have continued at a relentless pace,
despite disputed government claims that ceasefire talks are ongoing
with insurgent leaders.
The uprising is estimated to have cost more than 10 000 lives.

- AFP

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Nigerian Govt reaches ceasefire agreement withBoko Haram

According to a breaking news report on Channels TV, the Nigerian
government has reached a ceasefire agreement with Boko Hraram
following today's meeting between government officials led by
President Jonathan's principal private secretary, Amb. Tukur, Chadian
government and reps of the sect group led by Danaldi Ahmadu.

To this end, the Chief of Defence Staff, Alex Badeh, has directed all
service chiefs to comply with the ceasefire agreement between Nigeria
and Boko Haram in all areas of operations. Securing the release of the
219 Chibok girls abducted by Boko Haram was a major part of their
discussions. More later...

Source - Linda ikeji blog

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Obasanjo’s son in stable condition after being shot by Boko Haram.

 Son of former President Olusegun Obasanjo,
Adeboye Obasanjo who suffered gunshot injuries
yesterday September 8th after his platoon was
attacked by Boko Haram men in Baza, Adamawa state
is said to be in stable condition after being treated in
hospital.

24 soldiers were reportedly killed during the attack
which saw the army lose an armored tank to the sect
members. Adeboye Obasanjo, an army engineer, was
a Lieutenant Colonel at the 3rd Division in Jos,
Plateau State and was head of the army platoon
stationed at Baza.

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