The Nigerian military says a senior Boko Haram field commander has been killed during a night operation in the country’s northeast, alongside 10 other fighters, as troops press deeper into insurgent strongholds in Borno state.
According to the army, the operation took place late Saturday in the Kodunga area, where soldiers launched a coordinated assault on militant positions. Weapons, food supplies and medical items were recovered from the site, the military said.
Among those killed was Abu Khalid, described by the army as a key Boko Haram commander operating from the Sambisa Forest. He played a central role within “the terrorist hierarchy, coordinating operations and logistics in the Sambisa axis,” army spokesman Sani Uba said in a statement.
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The military announcement follows a deadly week in the region, during which Boko Haram fighters carried out two separate attacks on a construction site and a military base, leaving dozens of people dead in northeastern Nigeria, the AP reported.
Boko Haram began its insurgency in 2009, launching an armed campaign against Western education and seeking to impose its hardline interpretation of Islamic law. Over time, the conflict has grown more complex, with the emergence of a rival faction aligned with the Islamic State group, known as the Islamic State West Africa Province, or ISWAP.
The violence has spread beyond Nigeria’s borders into neighboring countries such as Niger and has had a devastating human toll. About 35,000 civilians have been killed and more than 2 million people displaced, according to United Nations estimates.
Security analyst Taiwo Adebayo of the Institute for Security Studies said the military shifted tactics last month by taking the fight directly to insurgent hideouts. The new approach marked “a departure from the usual reactive posture that saw the military suffer dozens of raids on their camps last year.”
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Adebayo added that U.S. intelligence-gathering flights over Borno state since November have supported Nigerian operations against armed groups, improving the effectiveness of recent raids.
Nigeria continues to face a widening security challenge, with the Islamist insurgency in the northeast unfolding alongside a sharp rise in kidnappings for ransom by armed gangs across the northwest and north-central regions in recent months.
In December, the United States also carried out airstrikes in northern Nigeria targeting Islamic State fighters, following allegations that authorities had failed to curb attacks on Christian communities.
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