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CHAD-CONFLICT-BOKOHARAM
Boko Haram jihadist attack kills 8 in Chad: sources
N’DJAMENA, June 23, 2019 (BSS/AFP) – Seven Chadian soldiers and a local
guard were killed in a Boko Haram jihadist ambush in Lake Chad, the latest in
a surge of attacks in the region, security sources said on Sunday.
Boko Haram militants have been waging a decade-long insurgency in northwest
Nigeria, but the conflict has spilled into Lake Chad where Nigeria borders
Niger, Chad and Cameroon.
Security sources said the seven Chadian soldiers and the guard were killed
in an ambush on Friday in Mbomouga in Chad’s Ngouboua area, and another 13
people were wounded.
“The Boko Haram forces lost six of their people and left behind two
weapons,” one security source said.
Among the soldiers killed was a gendarme colonel, the source said. Another
source said three army officers were killed in the attack.
Since 2018, Boko Haram has carried out at least nine attacks on Chad. But
the jihadist group has stepped up attacks outside Nigeria after a period of
calm last year.
Last month, militants killed four people in an attack on a Cameroonian
island on Lake Chad and Boko Haram killed another 13 villagers in eastern
Chad.
In March jihadists killed at least 23 Chadian soldiers in an attack on an
army post in the group’s deadliest attack on the country’s military.
Since 2015, troops from Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Nigeria have been
grouped into a mixed, multi-national force in a bid to help fight Islamist
militants.
BSS/AFP/RY/1920 hrs