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Islamic militants with the extremist group Al-Shabaab mounted a bloody attack Thursday on government administration offices in Baidoa, Somalia.
Initial reports to police indicate that nine people, including four attackers, were killed after gunmen in military uniforms attacked the house of the former Somali parliament speaker and current president of the newly established southwest regional administration, said Col. Mahad Abdi, a Somali police officer.
Nigeria said on Wednesday that 36 towns had been retaken from Boko Haram since the start of a four-nation military offensive, voicing hope that the operation could lead to the group’s “total defeat”.
National security spokesman Mike Omeri said four towns had fallen since last Friday, including three in Borno state and Buni Yadi, in neighbouring Yobe, where the insurgents slaughtered more than 40 students in February last year before seizing it in August.
There are reports of continued fighting at the Brak Al-Shatti civilian and military airport located about 500 km south of Tripoli and just north of Sebha.
The heavy fighting is reported to be between the Third Force of the Central Shield and the Libyan National Army.
Chad and Niger have launched a joint army operation against Boko Haram militants in Nigeria, military sources said, stepping up a regional push to end the Sunni Muslim group’s six-year insurgency.
Boko Haram has expanded cross-border raids into Cameroon, Chad and Niger in recent months. This has spurred Nigeria’s neighbours to retaliate, although cooperation between them and Abuja has been limited and at times strained.
Coordinated multiple bomb blasts, separately detonated by three suspected female Boko Haram suicide bombers, Saturday, rocked the Maiduguri Monday Market (MMM), Borno Express Terminus motor park and Baga road fish market, killing 55 people and injuring 86 others within an hour.
This came as the Nigerian Army through a signed statement announced the recovery of two more local governments from the insurgents.
Boko Haram militants, have pledged allegiance to Islamic State, according to a message on the group’s Twitter account.
The message, which could not immediately be verified, appeared to be by the group’s leader, Abu Bakr bin Mohammed Shekau, who addressed himself as the Imam of Jamaátu Ahlus Sunnah Lidda’awati Wal Jihad (Boko Haram) and was addressed to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi al-Husseini al-Qurashi, the leader of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) or Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS).
Fresh fighting erupted in the crisis-stricken South Sudan on Saturday, a day after warring factions missed a deadline set by regional mediators to strike a final pact to end the 14-month conflict.
Government troops battled rebel fighters loyal to former Vice President Riek Machar in the border state of Western Bahr el Ghazal, and on two fronts in the oil-producing Upper Nile state, military spokesman Col. Philip Aguer told The Wall Street Journal.