Boko Haram kills six Nigerien soldiers, torch houses in Karamga border attacks

AS the Nigerien and Chadian troops rout out fleeing Boko Haram terrorists in the Lake Chad Basin Areas of North East sub-region of Nigeria, gunmen in a convoy of Toyota Hilux vehicles and motorcycles Friday clashed with Nigerien soldiers at Karamga village on shores of Lake Chad, killing six soldiers and torching of several houses and shops.

Karamga is mainly a fishing community in the Lake Chad border areas, and 30 kilometres east of Bosso town in Niger.

The attack on the village, according to a military source in Maiduguri Saturday, was in a “desperation of fleeing insurgents” to inflict more havoc to lives and property at Karamga that is currently hosting over 3, 650 fleeing residents of Gambouru, Damasak and Abadam in Nigeria and other attacked border towns of Bosso and Diffa in Niger.

“The outlets for these fleeing Boko Haram sect members, was to capitalized on some of the villages on Lake shores, like Karamga; for an escape route, into Chad or Niger. The Nigerien soldiers are however pursuing the fleeing insurgents that attacked this village on Friday night,” said the military source, who does not want to be quoted on Karamga attack.”

Isa Abdu, a resident of Bosso, also in a telephone interview Saturday said that Karamga village, was a safe haven for the fleeing insurgents, because the military “strategic focus” of the Chadian and Cameroonian  troops were on the Gambouru-Abadam-Damasak axis in Nigeria, while the Nigerien soldiers are pushing back the insurgents back Nigerian and across Kumadugu-Yobe River since last Tuesday.