Boko Haram terrorists in Nigeria murder at least 160, military ‘cannot win the war’
At least 160 people have died in terrorist related violence this week in Nigeria’s Yobe and Borno States.
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According to a news release from human rights group Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW), on the evening of Sept. 18, Boko Haram members armed with Kalashnikovs, rocket launchers and homemade bombs are reported to have stormed Yadi Buni Town in Yobe State.
In the first attack, on Tuesday, Boko Haram guerrillas wearing army uniforms stopped traffic on a highway between the cities of Maiduguri and Damaturu, dragging people out of their vehicles and killing them, with 143 bodies recovered so far.
Tuesday’s toll was initially given as “more than 20”, but information often takes days to leak out of the remote and sparsely populated regions.
“We have been picking corpses off the roadsides all day, there are more in the bush,” said Abdulazeez Kolomi, an Environmental Protection Agency official in Benisheik village.
“They are all travelers slaughtered by Boko Haram gunmen. We have so far picked up 143 corpses.”
On Thursday, following a similar pattern, Boko Haram insurgents killed at least 16 people in an attack on travelers plying a highway from Maiduguri to Bamboa, a police source collecting bodies on the scene told Reuters.
An offensive against Boko Haram has not worked and may have made things worse.
“They have taken to guerrilla tactics in rural areas, where the population are vulnerable,” said Kole Shettima, Africa director of the MacArthur Foundation, based in Nigeria.
“The military were winning some battles, but military deployments cannot win the war. Boko Haram can simply adapt,” he said.
