Nigeria’s military on Friday attacked Boko Haram Islamist
strongholds across the northeast, launching deadly air strikes on
insurgent camps, the military said, while residents reported that forces
had deployed in border areas to block the militants from fleeing.
Several thousand soldiers have spread across three northeastern
states where President Goodluck Jonathan imposed a state of emergency
after Boko Haram seized territory and declared war against the
government.
“There have been air strikes since
Wednesday,” defence spokesman Brigadier General Chris Olukolade told
AFP, specifying that they were continuing Friday.
“Every one of their strongholds is under attack,” he said, adding
that he believed “there are a lot of casualties,” without providing a
figure.
The offensive is ongoing in all three states put under emergency
decree, including Adamawa and Yobe, but Borno state is expected to see
the most intense fighting.
Many have warned that there is a risk of high civilian deaths and
Nigeria’s military has been accused of massive rights violations in the
past, including indiscriminate attacks on civilians.
The operation is the largest against Boko Haram since 2009, when
soldiers flooded Borno’s capital Maiduguri, killing more than 800 people
and forcing the insurgents underground for a year.
In the town of Gamburu Ngala on the border with Cameroon in northern
Borno, residents said that heavily armed troops and tanks arrived on
Wednesday, sealing off previously unmanned border posts.
Northeast Nigeria, the epicentre of the Boko Haram insurgency, has
porous borders with Cameroon, Chad and Niger, with criminal groups and
militants flowing freely between the countries.
“Since January the border posts have been abandoned…but now these
posts have been taken over by soldiers,” said resident Haruna Garba.
Olukolade confirmed that forces had been sent to the region, but would not say whether the borders had been sealed.
Reports of Boko Haram’s presence in Cameroon first emerged in
February, following the kidnap there of a French family visiting a game
park near the Nigerian border.
The abduction was claimed by Boko Haram and the family was released in April.
Soldiers have surrounded the town of Krenuwa in Marte district, also
in northern Borno and one of the areas where Boko Haram has taken power,
chased away all government officials and removed Nigerian flags,
residents said.
Abur Kullima told AFP Friday that he fled his home in Krenuwa in fear of the coming assault.
He said that after the state of emergency was declared in a national
broadcast late Tuesday, Islamist gunmen began moving through the
district trying to mobilise people “in preparation to face Nigerian
troops.”
“I was so scared for my life and my family’s, which led me to decide
to leave,” he told AFP from Gamburu Ngala, where he is staying with a
friend.
Anyone who tries to leave Krenuwa is screened by the soldiers who have encircled the town, he said.
Boko Haram has become notorious for blending in with the local
population, both in towns and major cities where they have carried out
suicide bombings as well as gun and bomb assaults.
The group says it is fighting to create an Islamic state in Nigeria’s
mainly Muslim north, but its demands have repeatedly shifted.
Some believe it has sought closer ties to foreign extremist groups
like Al-Qaeda’s North Africa affiliate, but most analysts believe its
agenda is primarily domestic.
Nigeria is Africa’s top oil producer but the population remains
extremely poor and many of Boko Haram’s fighters are believed to be
youths radicalised out of frustration with government corruption.
The conflict is estimated to have cost 3,600 lives since 2009, including killings by the security force
Friday, 17 May 2013
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