Close to six,000 fighters from the Boko Haram Islamist rebel group in northeast Nigeria have surrendered in current weeks, the Nigerian armed forces stated on Thursday, attributing the event to the navy’s counter-insurgency efforts.
Some 350,000 individuals have died within the battle between Boko Haram and the Nigerian military because it started 12 years in the past, based on a United Nations estimate, and the combating has spilled over to neighbouring Niger, Chad and Cameroon.
“Within the last few weeks, more than 5,890 terrorists comprising foot soldiers and their commanders have surrendered with their families to own troops in the North East Zone,” stated Brigadier General Bernard Onyeuko, spokesman for the armed forces.
He stated 565 of the surrendered fighters had been handed over to the federal government of northeastern Borno State for “further management after thorough profiling”, however gave no additional particulars.
Boko Haram, which acquired international notoriety with the mass kidnapping of schoolgirls from the city of Chibok in 2014, has been in a state of flux because of a battle with a splinter group-turned-rival, the Islamic State’s West Africa Province (ISWAP).
Boko Haram’s chief, Abubakar Shekau, died in May. According to ISWAP, he was fleeing a battle with ISWAP and detonated an explosive gadget earlier than he might be captured.
Observers expressed uncertainty as to what the repercussions of Shekau’s dying could be. The two teams had been combating one another for management of territory in northeast Nigeria and round Lake Chad.
The Nigerian authorities and armed forces have previously made statements about imminent success in opposition to Boko Haram, solely to have occasions on the bottom to contradict them.
Hundreds of Boko Haram fighters attacked a navy submit in southern Niger final week, killing 16 troopers, based on the Niger defence ministry.
At least 26 Chadian troopers had been killed earlier in August by suspected Boko Haram attackers, based on the Chadian military.
