Daesh-linked militants ambush convoy of Nigeria governor, kill 15

The assailants used machined guns and grenade launchers to attack the convoy on Friday, killing eight police officers, three soldiers, and four members of a government-backed militia force. The governor escaped the attack unharmed. The assault was carried out as the convoy was passing through a village near the headquarters of the Multinational Joint Activity Drive Force (MNJTF), a naval coalition force formed by troops from Nigeria, Niger, Chad and Cameroon. The governor was traveling to Baga as part of a preparation and assessment effort to arrange for the return of thousands of residents driven from the city by the Daesh-linked militants in 2014. Zulum was evacuated by helicopter to the garrison town of Monguno, 60 kilometers from the attack site. The Daesh-affiliated ISWAP group maintains most of its camps on islands in Lake Chad and the region is known as a bastion for the takfiris. The militant group has recently intensified attacks on military and civilian targets in the region. The decade-long insurgency in northeast Nigeria has killed 36,000 people and forced over 2 million from their homes. Chad forces kill 20 Boko Haram militants, free hostages in Chad, troops killed 20 Daesh-linked Boko Haram terrorists and freed 12 civilians -- including nine children – who were kidnapped in the Lake Chad region where borders of several countries come together. The group, which originated in Nigeria in 2009, has established bases on islets dotting Lake Chad, a vast swampy expanse on the border between formerly colonized African nations of Nigeria, Chad, Niger and Cameroon, all of which remain influenced by their former colonizers, particularly France. Earlier this month, Boko Haram militants raided a village in the restive region and kidnapped a group of civilians. The Chadian military forces launched a major offensive against Boko Haram militants in April after nearly 100 soldiers were killed in an attack on one of their bases. At the time, Chad’s President Idriss Deby claimed to have driven out the Daesh-linked terror group, but attacks have continued.   In Chad’s Lake Province alone, more than 360,000 people have fled their homes to escape terror attacks as well as flooding, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM). More than 36,000 people have been killed since 2009 in the terror acts waged by Boko Haram in the region, displacing more than two million more people who still cannot return to their homes. The United Nations estimates that nearly 7 million people depend on humanitarian aid to survive in the Lake Chad region. Militant attacks on rise across Africa amid foreign meddling There have been a growing number of attacks by militant groups in former colonized countries across East and Central Africa amid the persistent presence of foreign military forces to protect their interests in the mineral-rich yet very impoverished nations. Earlier this month, Daesh-linked militants in northern Mozambique seized two tiny islands in the Indian Ocean, threatening sea traffic in an area where a multi-billion-dollar offshore gas exploration project by French energy giant Total is under development. The seizure of Mecungo and Vamisse islands came a month after the terrorists occupied the strategic port town of Mocimboa da Praia, which was used for cargo deliveries for the development of the gas project.  The entire Sahel region is seeing ever more brazen attacks by Daesh-linked militants despite the beefing up of national armies and the deployment of 5,100 French troops. At least 15 people killed in militia attack in Ethiopia An attack by an armed militia left at least 15 people killed in western Ethiopia on Friday, the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (EHRC) said in a statement. The pre-dawn attack, the latest security challenge for Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s government, follows another one earlier this month that happened in the same Metakal zone of Ethiopia’s Benishangul-Gumuz region, which borders Sudan, where 30 people were killed. “Civilians are being subjected to repeated attacks with unmitigated cruelty in Benishangul-Gumuz,” said Daniel Bekele, the head of the EHRC. “Federal and regional authorities should take the required steps to enforce the rule of law and bring perpetrators to account.” The commission did not say who was behind the attacks.   This marks the latest incident of violence in the region. In June last year, men in camouflage uniforms killed over 50 people and injured 23 others in the same area. SOURCE: PRESS TV