 | Wars in the World |
Daily News on Wars in the World and on New States
| FOLLOW US ON: FACEBOOK X FLIPBOARD TELEGRAM |
Three suicide bombers attacked the island of Koulfoua on the Chadian side of Lake Chad on Saturday, killing around 30 people and injuring 80, two security sources told Reuters.
The sources said the attacks coincided with market day. It was not immediately clear who was responsible for the attacks although the swampy maze of islands has previously been targeted by Islamist militant group Boko Haram from neighboring Nigeria.
Recent fighting between local armed groups and the South Sudan army in the country’s Western Equatoria region has forced over 4,000 people to flee into a remote corner of eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), the UN Refugee Agency said.
Two UNHCR teams have so far this week registered 3,464 newly arrived refugees in areas near the border in DRC’s Dungu Territory, following clashes between the army and an armed group known as the “Arrow Boys.”
A new rebel faction in South Sudan’s Eastern Equatoria state has on Thursday claimed to have overrun a police post in Idolu, some 35 kilometers east of Torit town, capital of the state.
The new rebellion has raised fears of further escalations of violence in the area despite a peace agreement signed between president Salva Kiir and armed opposition faction, SPLM-IO, led by former vice president, Riek Machar, ending a 21-month long violent conflict in the country.
Residents told Sudan Tribune on Thursday that armed men in military trucks and wearing uniforms similar to the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA), which is the official army of South Sudan, appeared in the village of Idolu and without facing resistance declared control of the police post located outside the state capital, Torit.
Al-Shabaab militants in Somalia have overrun another town – this time Buqda in central Somalia, following the departure of the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) forces.
Despite pledging to return to retake the area, originally liberated from the militants only weeks before, Buqda became the third town to fall into the hands of the Takfiri group in a matter of days, joining El Saliindi, 65 km south of the capital, Mogadishu, and Kuntuwarey, on the road between the capital and the port of Barawe, both in the Lower Shabelle region.
With presence of Somali prime minister Omar Abdirashid, Galmudug and Puntland leaders have jointly signed a ceasefire deal, ending the persistent conflict in the divided Galkayo town.
Wednesday’s peace agreement is meant to stop weeks of armed clashes between Galmudug and Puntland forces in Galkayo which claimed the lives of at least 15 people while 30 others left wounded.
Al-Qaeda fighters retook on Wednesday two southern Yemeni towns they briefly occupied four years ago, residents and local fighters said, exploiting a collapse of central authority in Yemen which is in the throes of an eight-month war.
In an early morning surprise attack on the Abyan province capital Zinjibar and neighboring town of Jaar, the militants overcame local forces and announced their takeover over loudspeakers after dawn prayers.
The Cameroon army claimed Wednesday to have dealt a major blow to Nigeria’s Boko Haram Islamists, killing around 100 fighters and freeing 900 hostages in a three-day operation last week.
The claim, which could not be independently confirmed, comes on the heels of twin suicide attacks the previous day in the far north of Cameroon, an area repeatedly targeted by the jihadists.
At least six people died in the attacks, according to a new toll.