Suspected Islamist gunmen abducted about 20 women from a
nomadic settlement, according to Bloomberg News, near the northeastern Nigerian
town of Chibok, where more than 200 schoolgirls were kidnapped two months ago,
a local official said.
The ethnic Fulani women were taken after the assailants
attacked a settlement known as Garkin Fulani, at midday Sunday, and ordered the
women into their vehicles at gunpoint. Alhaji Tar, a member of the Vigilante
Group of Nigeria, said in a phone interview, confirmed this. They were driven
off to an unknown location, he said.
Boko Haram, the Islamist militant group whose insurgency
against Nigeria’s government has killed thousands of people over the past five
years, abducted more than 200 girls from a school in Chibok in April. The U.S.
and U.K. sent teams to Nigeria to help the government find the schoolgirls, and
Israel and France have pledged assistance.
Calls to Borno Police Commissioner Lawal Tanko’s mobile
phone didn’t connect, when Bloomberg news sought a comment on the latest
attack.
Separately in Borno, the Nigerian army killed more than 50
suspected insurgents in a June 7 operation, which prevented rebel assaults on
villages in Borno and Adamawa states, military authorities said today.
“The attack was launched on the terrorists as they filed out
of the forest to embark on their mission,” Nigeria’s Defense Headquarters said
in a statement posted on its Facebook page. Four soldiers were wounded in the
firefight, it said.
Sahara reporters
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