The Islamic State (IS) group has claimed to have killed 118 people in its self-styled “west Africa province” in the past week, after a series of attacks against military bases in northeast Nigeria.
The group said in a video posted online late on Thursday that it conducted five operations in Chad and Nigeria between Thursday last week and Wednesday, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors the activity of Muslim militants.
No other details were given, but the claim follows recent attacks on army bases in Borno State, northeast Nigeria, which has been the epicenter of the deadly nine-year conflict.
Security sources said at least 44 soldiers were killed in an attack in Metele Village, near the border with Niger, on Sunday last week, although one soldier who escaped gave a higher toll.
“The truth is we lost more than 100 men because we were quickly routed,” the soldier said on condition of anonymity from the Borno state capital, Maiduguri, on Friday. “We were outgunned, so we tried to fight. We realized it was unrealistic so we decided to leave.”
Most of the soldiers were killed as the trucks they were in tried to crash through a perimeter fence at the base, but got stuck, he said.
Senior officers were among the dead, he said.
Even a search team that came to find the bodies of fallen soldiers on Tuesday was attacked, the soldier said.
At least 17 attempts to overrun army bases have been reported since July. Many have been claimed by a faction of Boko Haram called the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP).
Security analysts said more attacks were expected in the run-up to Feb. 16, when Nigerians are to elect a new president and parliament.
However, Yan St-Pierre, a counterterrorism specialist with the Modern Security Consulting Group, said there were implications beyond Nigeria’s borders.
The intensity and regularity of recent attacks indicated that the ISWAP now had “a capacity for sustained warfare” and “a significant number of fighters and materials” at its disposal, St-Pierre said.
Asked whether that meant external support from Islamic State remnants from elsewhere, he said: “Without a doubt.”
“ISWAP’s attacks occur against military and foreign targets with increasing frequency in Nigeria, Chad and Niger, with an increasing presence in Cameroon,” St-Pierre said.
That “not only demonstrates that ISWAP has the capacity and the mobility to successfully organize attacks in multiple areas, but that its interests are fully regional,” he said.
“Put in the context of expanding IS activity in the Sahel [area of Africa] — especially eastwards — this regional focus is an important change that affects ISWAP military operations.”
More than 27,000 people have been killed since the insurgency began in 2009 and about 1.8 million are still homeless as aid agencies battle the humanitarian fallout of the fighting.
Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari, who was elected in 2015 on a pledge to defeat Boko Haram, has claimed the militants were “technically defeated.”
The recent attacks have cast doubt on that assertion and the main opposition People’s Democratic Party (PDP) is questioning Buhari’s security record.
PDP presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar sent a message of condolence to the families of those who were killed and said the losses were “a clear sign that our troops need to be better funded and better equipped.”
Soldiers have complained of being over-stretched and under-resourced.
Nigerian Senate leader Bukola Saraki said that a delegation of senators would travel to the northeast to visit frontline troops, while others questioned the effectiveness of the counterinsurgency.
Peter Ayodele Fayose, a former state governor and leading PDP figure, said: “It is time that we face the reality that Boko Haram is not technically defeated.”
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