Nigeria’s military has freed dozens of captives in its latest attack against armed groups in the country’s troubled northwest. Officials said 76 hostages, among them women and children, were rescued after a series of precision airstrikes struck militant hideouts near Pauwa Hill in Katsina state.
The operation, carried out in the early hours of Saturday, was part of a manhunt for a notorious kidnapper, according to Nasir Mu’azu, Katsina’s commissioner for internal security. Among those freed were victims of a recent mosque attack in Unguwan Mantau, where at least 50 worshippers were killed.
“However, it was regrettably noted that one child tragically lost his life during the ordeal,” Mu’azu confirmed in his statement.
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The commissioner added in an AP report that the strikes are “part of a broader strategy to dismantle criminal hideouts, weaken their networks and put an end to the cycle of killings, kidnappings, and extortion that have plagued innocent citizens.”
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Nigeria’s northwest and north-central regions have endured worsening violence in recent years, often fueled by clashes between farming and herding communities over scarce resources. Just last month, gunmen killed around 150 people in one north-central village, underscoring the scale of the crisis.
On the same day as the Katsina rescue, another round of airstrikes in the northwest killed 35 militants in a separate mission.
The country is also contending with a long-running insurgency in the northeast, where jihadist groups have killed roughly 35,000 civilians and forced more than 2 million people from their homes, according to United Nations estimates. Despite President Bola Tinubu’s pledges to stem the violence, armed groups continue to mount deadly assaults.
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