Over 10 killed as militants ambush convoy in northeastern Nigeria
A militant attack on a convoy has killed at least nine Nigerian soldiers and two members of a civil defense militia in the country’s troubled northeastern Borno state, security sources and local leaders say.
The attack took place Saturday afternoon outside Komala village near the town of Damboa, which is located 90 kilometers from the regional capital Maiduguri.
Security sources said the militants opened fire with heavy guns and rocket-propelled grenades on the convoy of more than a hundred vehicles in the troubled region.
"It was an ambush on a civilian convoy escorted by troops and the militia," AFP quoted a military officer as saying.
"Nine soldiers and two (anti-militants) militia were killed in the attack,” the officer added
Ibrahim Liman, a regional militia leader said the bodies of victims have been retrieved from the site.
"The bodies of nine soldiers and two vigilantes were recovered from the attack along with others who sustained injuries," Liman said.
The militants seized several vehicles and looted supplies before withdrawing to their Sambisa enclave, he added.
Several civilians were still missing and were presumed killed or abducted by the attackers, militia leader said.
Damboa lies on the fringes of Boko Haram's Sambisa forest enclave from where the Takfiri militant group launches attacks on villages and against troops.
Boko Haram and its Daesh-linked ISWAP splinter group are notorious for ambushing military and civilian convoys on highways in addition to abducting travelers at bogus checkpoints.
Around 36,000 people have been killed in the decade-long Takfiri terrorism which has spilled over into neighboring Chad, Niger and Cameroon and forced more than two million people to flee their homes.
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