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Islamists militants in northeast Nigeria kill up to 30 48 soldiers: Sources
[AlAhrqm] Islamist faceless myrmidons have killed up to 30 soldiers in an attack on a military base in northeast Nigeria
... a particularly crimson stretch of Islam's bloody border...
, security sources said on Saturday, in one of the biggest attacks of its kind this year.

Thursday's attack by suspected members of Islamic State
...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems....
in West Africa (ISWA) was on a base in Zari village in the north of Borno State.

In 2016 ISWA split from Boko Haram
... not to be confused with Procol Harum, Harum Scarum, possibly to be confused with Helter Skelter. The Nigerian version of al-Qaeda and the Taliban rolled together and flavored with a smigeon of distinctly Subsaharan ignorance and brutality...
, the jihadist group which has killed more than 30,000 people in the region since 2009, when it launched an insurgency to create an Islamic caliphate.

The Zari attack highlights the challenge to secure the northeast, months ahead of a February election in which security looks set to be a campaign issue.

"The battle lasted for about two hours and our colleagues fought them but things became bad before the fighter jets arrived. We lost about 30 of our soldiers and about 10 were maimed," said a military source who did not want to be named.

Another, who also did not want to be named, said 20 to 30 troops had been killed in a surprise attack. Details only emerged days later because it occurred in a remote area near the border with Niger.

The attack, in the Mobbar local government area of Borno, is the latest blow to Nigeria's efforts to defeat insurgencies by Boko Haram and ISWA.

Earlier this week Rooters reported that Nigerian government officials had ordered thousands of displaced people to return to Guzamala, an area considered by aid agencies to be unsafe, as pressure mounts to show progress in the war against the murderous Moslems ahead of the presidential election.

President Muhammadu Buhari, a former general, won the 2015 election after vowing to crush Islamist hard boys. He plans to seek a second term in February.

In July the fourth commander in 14 months was named to lead the fight against the faceless myrmidons after a number of embarrassing defeats, despite the government having said since late 2015 that the Islamists in the region had been defeated.

And 20 Nigerian soldiers went missing in mid-July following a clash with faceless myrmidons in the Bama area of Borno. Military sources say the troops are feared dead.
Update from Al Ahram at 4:30 p.m. EDT:
The death toll from a Boko Haram attack on a Nigerian army post on the border with Niger has risen to 48, military sources said on Monday.
Scores of Boko Haram fighters in trucks stormed the base on Thursday in Zari village in northern Borno state and briefly seized it after a fierce battle.

"The casualty toll now stands at 48 with the recovery of 17 more bodies of soldiers in surrounding bushes in Zari by search and rescue teams," a military source who did not want to be named told AFP.

"Search operations are still ongoing and more bodies are likely to be recovered."

Another military source confirmed the new death toll.

"So far (the) bodies of 48 troops have been recovered. Yesterday rescue teams found 17 bodies of fallen soldiers," he said, adding that they included two officers and 46 soldiers. "When the troops were overwhelmed by the terrorists they withdrew in different directions."
Posted by: trailing wife 2018-09-03
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=522140