Nigeria | Boko Haram kills at least 11 in another attack

Defence Redefined

26/12/2020

Boko Haram jihadists attacked a predominantly Christian village in northeastern Nigeria on Christmas Eve, killing at least 11 people, set fire to a church and abducted a pastor, according to officials. 

Fighters in trucks and motorcycles stormed Pemi, a predominantly Christian village in Borno state on Thursday, shooting “indiscriminately” and setting buildings on fire, said Abwaku Kabu, head of a paramilitary organization operating in the area.

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“The terrorists killed seven people, burnt 10 homes and looted food supplies that were meant to be distributed to residents to celebrate Christmas,” Kabu said.

Another four bodies were found by volunteers in bushy areas around the village, added community spokesman Ayuba Alamson, raising the number of dead to eleven.

The toll could rise as villagers fled into the bush during the attack and some people are still unaccounted for. 

The assailants, who drove from the group’s nearby Sambisa forest enclave, looted medical supplies from a hospital before setting it ablaze, the militia leader said, adding they also burnt a church and abducted a priest.

In many parts of Nigeria, communities have been forced to form paramilitary groups to defend themselves. These groups often act on the side of the army. The village of Pemi, in the state of Borno, is twenty kilometers from Chibok, where Boko Haram abducted more than two hundred schoolgirls six years ago. 

Gunmen also attacked another Christian community in Garkida, in the neighboring state of Adamawa, on Thursday, looting drug stores and food supplies before torching homes, according to local sources.

Boko Haram has recently stepped up its attacks in northeastern Nigeria. Three people were killed and two seriously injured on December 18 in a teenage suicide bomber attack in the city of Kontuga, 38 km from Maiduguri, the capital of Borno state.

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Boko Haram and the Islamic State in West Africa Province (ISWAP) – formed when a splinter group of Boko Haram split off – continue the guerrilla war that broke out in 2009 and has claimed the lives of more than 36,000 people, mostly in Nigeria, while displacing some other 2 million civilians.

The 78-year-old Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari, in a statement on Thursday, “reiterated the promise of his administration to remain unyielding in confronting the Boko Haram insurgency as well as other forms of criminality.”

Source: CNA

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