Terrorists kill eight in Borno, U.S. pledges aid to Nigerian troops

Niger arrests 160 suspected B’ Haram members

SUSPECTED Boko Haram terrorists yesterday detonated two bombs at Miringa junction in Biu, Borno State, killing eight people and injuring six others.

  According to an eyewitness, Pulgwa Fitikir, the bombs were

simultaneously detonated by two suspected terrorists that

alighted from separate tricycles at the Miringa junction of Biu in the

early hours of Tuesday.

  The incident occurred as authorities of the Niger Police announced arrest of 160 suspected Boko Haram militants allegedly involved in deadly attacks near that country’s border with Nigeria.

  Meanwhile, the Commander of U.S. Special Forces operations in Africa, Brigadier General James Linder,s has said the United States military will provide communications equipment and intelligence to help African nations in the fight against Boko Haram.

  Biu is second largest town in Borno State, and 187 kilometres south of Maiduguri, the capital.

“When the tricyclists were subjected to a ‘stop and search’ at a military checkpoint at Miringa junction, two suicide bombers detonated explosives strapped to their waists and killed eight people, including security personnel that participated in checking the vehicles,” Fitikir said yesterday in a telephone in Maiduguri.

  He further disclosed that nine other passersby were also injured in the twin blasts.

  “We heard early this morning that some Boko Haram gunmen were

approaching this town. The military personnel were alerted before these boys detonated two bombs strapped on their waists when they were subjected to checking at military post at Miringa junction. About an hour after the alert, we heard a deafening explosion that rocked the township for some seconds, before the junction was cordoned off at 9am,” Fitikir explained.

 The Guardian learnt that all the injured persons have been evacuated to the General Hospital in Biu for treatment, while bodies of the blasts victims were taken to the hospital morgue for identification before their release for burials.

  A military source in Biu, who was not authorized to speak said: “Some Boko Haram suspects wanted to invade this checkpoint this morning but were intercepted from proceeding to the township to cause havoc. The two suspected suicide bombers however detonated the material they wore on their waists and skilled some people, including one of our men at this post.”

He said the suicide bombers came through the Biu-Damaturu road from the Gujba Forests in Yobe State.

    West African military commanders have long complained that cross-border operations against Islamist groups, from al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) in Mali to Boko Haram in Nigeria, have been obstructed by lack of compatible communications equipment, making it hard to swap 

  A report by Reuters quoted Brigadier General Linder as saying that, as part of the annual U.S-backed ‘Flintlock’ counter-terrorism exercises this year in Chad, the United States would provide technology allowing African partners to communicate between cell phones, radios and computers.

  The system also incorporates a translation function that would allow commanders in francophone countries like Chad to communicate by message with English-speaking officers in Nigeria, a U.S. military officer said.

 Amid growing international alarm, the four nations of the Lake Chad region — Chad, Niger, Cameroon and Nigeria — plus neighboring Benin are preparing a joint task force of 8,700 men to take on the Sunni jihadist group.

  Chad’s military, which played a leading role in a French-led campaign that ousted Islamist groups from northern Mali in 2013, has already led attacks against Boko Haram positions in Nigeria’s border regions.

  “The Lake Chad nations are battling Boko Haram and we have a vested interest in that group of nations’ collective success. What Boko Harm is doing is a murderous rampage, about brutality intolerance and subjugation,” Linder said in an interview late on Monday.

  “Our national leadership has been very clear that more was going to be done … There is an ongoing discussion on how will we provide additional tools, techniques, and material to partner nations.”

  At the Flintlock exercises, the U.S. military will also be introducing a Cloud-based technology to allow African allies to quickly share intelligence across borders, such as mapping information on sthe location of potential targets, Linder said.