At least four civilians and four members of the Nigerian security forces were killed during a jihadist attack on Friday in Difa, the capital in the southeastern part of the country, the government in Niamey announced last night.
According to a Defense Ministry statement cited by public television, the still “provisional” report speaks of “four elements of the defense and security forces and four civilians who died”, another “eight elements of the defense and security forces and five civilians who were injured”. And, “on the enemy side”, for “many terrorists neutralized” (s.s .: dead), of whom “six corpses were abandoned” in the field.
According to the announcement, a “clearing operation” is underway in the area where the attack took place.
According to residents of Difa, “two gendarmes and two policemen” were killed, while civilians were mainly hit “by stray bullets” during heavy fighting.
Earlier in the day, authorities in Difa told AFP on Saturday afternoon that three people had been killed, two gendarmes and a policeman, and two gendarmes were injured.
Government forces destroyed seven vehicles of the perpetrators to which they had attached heavy machine guns and confiscated weapons and other material. Three cars, machine guns, rocket launchers, a mortar shell, a large quantity of ammunition, jihadist banners, mobile phones, drugs and syringes were confiscated, according to authorities.
The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) jihadist group, formed after Boko Haram broke up, and Boko Haram itself have repeatedly launched attacks in Niger since 2015.
On Friday, a local government official in the Difa district told AFP that “Boko Haram elements had attacked” in Bagara, in the southern part of the city of the same name, not far from the border with Nigeria. He added that there was a “reaction” of the security and defense forces, which used, among other things, “heavy weapons”, while he spoke of “panic moves” of several citizens due to the hostilities in the fortified city of 200,000 inhabitants.
The Difa region is home to an estimated 300,000 Nigerian refugees and displaced people who have fled their homes since 2015 to escape the atrocities of jihadists.
The armed conflict, which has been raging in northeastern Nigeria since 2009, the Boko Haram insurgency and later the IKDA and security forces’ crackdown on them, has left at least 36,000 people dead and displaced about two million displaced civilians. to return to their homes. This war has spread to other countries in the region.
Niger is also facing, in its western part, on the border with Mali and Burkina Faso, frequent attacks by Sahel jihadist organizations, including the Islamic State in the Sahara (IS).
