The Borno Police Command on Friday confirmed the killing of seven persons after two suspected female suicide bombers attacked Mandarari ward in Konduga Local Government Area of Borno, like reported by premiumtimesng.com.

Murtala Ibrahim of the Borno Police Command Public Relations Unit, confirmed the incident in a statement he issued in Maiduguri.

Mr. Ibrahim said the attack took place on Thursday night.

“Yesterday at about 22.45 hours, two suspected female suicide bombers detonated explosives strapped to their bodies at Mandarari ward in Konduga LGA, killing themselves and five others.

“Six persons sustained various degrees of injuries.

“The corpses and injured persons were evacuated to General Hospital Konduga, and normalcy restored to the area.”

Use of suicide bombers by the Boko Haram on civilian and military targets appear to be on the increase in 2015.

Earlier on Wednesday night, three suicide bombers who attempted to attack a military outpost were killed by soldiers after which their explosives detonated.

The three female teenage suicide bombers attempted to attack a military outpost popularly known as “Gontanamo” along muna garage at about 10:05 p.m. on Wednesday.

After being sighted by the troops in their attempt to gain access to the premises, the bombers were shot leading to the explosion of their concealed bombs.

The spokesperson of the National Emergency Management Agency, NEMA, in the North-East, Ibrahim Abdulkadir, confirmed that the corpses of suicide bombers were evacuated by emergency officials

“We have evacuated the corpses of female teenagers. One security personnel who was injured is being treated,” he said.

Unknown gunmen shot dead Somali Minister of Public Works and Reconstruction Abbas Abdullahi Sheikh Siraji on Wednesday evening in the restive Mogadishu, police and government officials said according to china.org.cn .

Somali Minister of Information and National Guidance Abdurahman Omar Osman confirmed the killing, saying the deceased was killed close to the presidential palace by gunmen.

“I can confirm that the minister of public works and reconstruction of Somalia was killed in Mogadishu in an attack this evening, Security agencies are investigating the case, may his soul rest in peace,” Osman said.

He said security officers have launched investigations to establish the reason behind the killing which has sparked tension among government officials in the Horn of Africa nation.

A senior police officer said four suspected soldiers have been arrested pending investigations into the attack.

Siraji was the youngest member of the Somali Federal Parliament and became minister in the Somali cabinet in March.

One person was killed and nine were wounded Wednesday when suspected Islamic extremists fired rockets into a U.N peacekeeping camp in Mali, like reported by voanews.com.

The nationality of the person killed was not known. The wounded included a Swedish peacekeeper and Liberian soldiers.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack on the camp in Timbuktu, but the U.N. mission called it a terrorist incident.

Al-Qaida-linked militants were behind another rocket attack on the camp last year.

U.N. peacekeepers and French forces are helping Mali deal with the remnants of an Islamic insurgency in the north. Militants briefly took over the area in 2012 after a failed coup in Bamako.

The militants have also spread to southern Mali, along the border with Burkina Faso.

Boko Haram’s leader Abubakar Shekau has been injured and one of his deputies killed in an air strike in northeast Nigeria, civilian and security sources told according to iafrica.com.

Two Nigerian Air Force jets bombarded fighters who had gathered for prayers in Balla village, some 40 kilometres (25 miles) from Damboa, on the edge of the Sambisa Forest, last Friday.

“Shekau was wounded in the bombings and is believed to be receiving treatment near the Nigerian border with Cameroon around Kolofata,” said one source with contacts within Boko Haram.

“His deputy, Abba Mustapha, alias Malam Abba, was killed in the attack along with another key lieutenant, Abubakar Gashua, alias Abu Aisha,” he added.

Babakura Kolo, a member of the civilian militia in the Borno state capital, Maiduguri, gave a similar account, saying “Shekau was injured and a number of commanders were killed.

“Among them is his deputy called Malam Abba. They suffered heavy casualties because the bombings targeted a large gathering of his followers attending Friday prayers.”

There was no immediate comment from the Nigerian military when contacted by AFP. The authorities have previously claimed to have killed Shekau on at least three occasions.

Nine Malian soldiers were killed and five wounded in an area regularly targeted by jihadist groups, as the commander of France’s counter-terrorism force for the region said an operation on the Burkina Faso border was ongoin, like reported digitaljournal.com.

“A supply mission for the national armed forces fell into an ambush between Dogofri and Nampala. The initial toll is nine dead and five wounded,” commerce minister and government spokesman Abdel Karim Konate said in a statement.

He condemned the “cowardly and barbaric act” and said “our commitment, as well as that of our partners, is to relentlessly pursue the fight against terrorism and drug trafficking” in Mali.

A Malian military source earlier said eight soldiers were killed and four wounded in the attack in the central region of Segou.

The troops’ vehicle hit a mine and they were then ambushed by the group, a Malian security source told AFP, recounting what is a familiar jihadist tactic.

Nampala, a garrison town near the Mauritanian border, has been targeted by several jihadist attacks.

Three Malian jihadist groups with previous Al-Qaeda links recently joined forces to create the “Group to Support Islam and Muslims” (GSIM), led by Iyad Ag Ghaly of Ansar Dine, and have also killed soldiers further east near the Burkina Faso border.

Troops from Operation Barkhane, a French counterterrorism operation, announced at the weekend they had killed or captured 20 jihadists in the forest of Foulsare near the border of Mali and Burkina Faso.

Barkhane’s commander Francois-Xavier de Woillemont said in Ouagadougou the operation was not yet over, and the final goal of such missions was “to get rid of the terrorists” who “harass local people and stop them living a normal life.”

It was the next step in operations undertaken in the zone “where we know that terrorists come to hide,” he added.

Last July, 17 soldiers were killed in an attack on a military base in Nampala claimed by the Islamist organisation Ansar Dine.

A similar attack on the town in January 2015 claimed the lives of 11 Malian soldiers, who struggle to keep security in this sprawling west African nation despite the presence of French and United Nations troops.

Residents of Niono, to the south of Nampala, told AFP they had seen reinforcements heading towards the area of Tuesday’s attack.

The region where the soldiers were killed on Tuesday, Segou, is also rife with tensions between ethnic groups who dispute the use of land for farming and raising cattle.

Northern Mali fell to jihadist groups linked to Al-Qaeda in March 2012, and although these forces were driven out of key towns by a French-led military intervention the following year, the Islamists have now spread further south.

Read more: http://www.digitaljournal.com/news/world/nine-malian-soldiers-killed-in-central-mali-attack/article/491713#ixzz4g0AF7Eve

The United States military is allegedly running a network of secret military bases across Africa, new documents have revealed for the first time, like reported by alaraby.co.uk.

The United States Africa Command (AFRICOM) troops are currently located at the al-Wigh airbase in southern Libya, anonymous Libyan military sources have told The New Arab.

The sources’ testimony supports a top-secret document showing the location of 36 AFRICOM bases in 24 African countries that have not been previously disclosed in official reports.

One AFRICOM source said that these bases were used to launch rapid responses to security situations including “increased threats” such as the movement of extremist groups.

The US military base at al-Wigh, located in the Fezzan region of southwest Libya near the Niger border, lies in an area under the control of General Haftar’s Libyan National Army (LNA).

The Libyan military sources, who chose to remain anonymous for professional reasons, said the existence of al-Wigh airbase pointed towards the LNA’s co-operation with the US military.

The LNA was formed in 1988 to overthrow Gaddafi without success and Haftar was forced into exile in North Virginia, allegedly under CIA’s employment for the next 20 years, prior to his return to Libya in 2011.

The Washington Post reports he lived in two Virginian towns, Falls Church and Vienna – located only seven miles away from the CIA headquarters.

The documents, obtained by TomDispatch under the United States’ Freedom of Information Act, contradict AFRICOM’s official statements dating back a decade – showing the scale of American military bases around the world.

French soldiers killed or captured about 20 terrorists in Mali’s restive north where a French soldier was killed on April 5, the French chief of staff said according to arabnews.com

Troops from Operation Barkhane, a French counter-terror operation whose mission is to target militant groups operating in the Sahel region south of the Sahara Desert, launched the operation on Saturday south-west of the city of Gao.

“Since Saturday, the Barkhane force has been engaged in an operation which led to the neutralization of nearly 20 jihadists in the forest of Foulsare near the border between Mali and Burkina Faso,” a statement said.

They were either killed or captured, spokesman Col. Patrik Steiger told AFP without giving a breakdown.
French Mirage fighter jets bombed several arms depots in the forest, a sanctuary for armed terrorist groups.

Set up in 2014, the operation comprises around 4,000 soldiers who are deployed across five countries — Mauritania, Mali, Niger, Chad and Burkina Faso. In Niger, it operates four Mirage 2000 fighter jets and five Reaper drones for gathering intelligence.

Mali’s north fell under the control of terrorist groups linked to Al-Qaeda in 2012 who hijacked an ethnic Tuareg-led rebel uprising, though the militants were largely ousted by a French-led military operation in January 2013.

But militants continue to roam the country’s north and center, mounting attacks on civilians and the army, as well as French and UN forces still stationed there.

In a weekend operation involving airstrikes, French forces have reported killing or capturing 20 jihadists hiding in a forest near the border between Mali and Burkina Faso. A French soldier had been killed last month, like reported by  dw.com

A statement from the French regional force in Mali said the operation involved air and ground forces but it did not identify which militant group had been attacked. Operation Barkhane is an ongoing anti-insurgent operation in Africa’s Sahel semi-arid region.

The militants were targeted in a forest in the southwest of Gao province in an operation which began on Saturday, Colonel Patrik Steiger, a military spokesman told AFP on Sunday. The operation began with air strikes by Mirage 2000 jets on supply depots which had been located in an earlier operation.

The French “force has been engaged in an operation in which it was possible to neutralize about 20 terrorists in the Foulsare forest near the border between Mali and Burkina Faso,” Steiger said. Helicopters transported ground forces who had found weapons including rocket launchers and ammunition.

Steiger said the militants were either killed or captured, but he did not give further details.

The operation took place in an area where a French soldier had been killed on April 5. On Saturday, Mali’s National Assembly voted to extend a state of emergency by six months in a bid to control an upsurge in attacks.

Operation Barkhane

There are 4,000 French soldiers deployed in the region since 2014 as part of Operation Barkhane, named after a crescent-shaped dune in the Sahara desert.

The French counterterrorism operation is being carried out in partnership with five countries and former colonies which span the Sahel: Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger – collectively referred to as the “G5 Sahel.”

French, Malian and UN forces are regular targets of attacks in the area.

On April 20, France “welcomed the establishment” of interim authorities responsible for the five regions of northern Mali.

Nigerian Air Force (NAF) fighter jets on Friday successfully destroyed an artillery piece being sneaked into Sambisa forest by insurgents, like reported by dailypost.ng .

Air Commodore Olatokunbo Adesanya, Director of Public Relations and Information, in a statement, said the artillery piece was concealed under a tree and sighted by a NAF Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) aircraft while on daytime patrol in the Sambisa general area.

He said that about seven insurgents were also observed to be moving out from under the tree.

“The crew on board the ISR platform therefore, immediately called for air strikes by NAF combat platforms.

“Following the alert, one Alpha Jet and one F-7Ni fighter aircraft were scrambled for air interdiction on the artillery piece.

“The Alpha Jet and F-7Ni strikes were observed to have hit the target. Thereafter, the Alpha Jet strafed the area with rockets and the location of the artillery piece was completely engulfed in an inferno.

“Subsequently, Battle Damage Assessment (BDA) footage by a NAF ISR aircraft revealed that the strikes were successful as the artillery piece was neutralised,” Adesanya explained.

Adesanya stated that with the successful attacks, attempts by the remnants of the insurgents to reinforce their capability with the artillery piece was thwarted.

At least five soldiers killed, 40 wounded after bomber detonates explosives-laden vehicle near troop convoy

A suicide car bomber has attacked a military convoy in northeast Nigeria, killing five soldiers and injuring another 40, security forces have said like reported by aljazeera.com.

Two military officers told the AFP news agency on Friday that the attacker, believed to be loyal to factional Boko Haram leader Abu Mus’ab Al-Barnawi, targeted the convoy, which was conducting “clearance operations” between Yobe and Borno states.

“At about 10:00 GMT on Thursday, a suicide bomber believed to be a Boko Haram terrorist riding in a van loaded with explosives rammed into a military convoy at Manguzum village,” one said.

“We lost five soldiers in the incident and more than 40 sustained various degrees of injuries,” added the officer, who asked to remain anonymous because he was not authorised to speak about the incident.

In a separate development, at least 15 gunmen believed to be Boko Haram fighters were shot dead during a battle with soldiers.

Kinsley Samuel, Nigeria’s military spokesman, said that the fighting occurred in the Sambisa forest in the country’s north.

There has been a spate of deadly attacks on military targets in recent months, as troops fight to end the eight-year insurgency, which has killed thousands of civilians.

A multinational force of troops from Nigeria and its neighbours last year drove Boko Haram out of towns and villages in northeast Nigeria, but isolated attacks and suicide bombings continue.

In December, President Muhammadu Buhari said the capture of a key camp marked the “final crushing” of Boko Haram in its last enclave in Sambisa Forest, once the group’s stronghold.

But since then, the group, which split into two factions last year, has stepped up its attacks.

One Boko Haram faction is led by Abubakar Shekau from the Sambisa Forest. Abu Mus’ab Al-Barnawi leads the other faction, based in the Lake Chad region, which has pledged allegiance to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) group.

At least 20,000 people have been killed in the Boko Haram conflict since it began in 2009 and more than 2.6 million others made homeless.