TIMELINES

The Punch reports that the incident was confirmed by the police public relations officer (PPRO) of the Borno police command, Victor Isuku. The police spokesperson said the suicide bombers were stopped at the outskirt of Maiduguri before they could carry out the act.The suicide bombers had targeted a checkpoint in the city, but failed to reach the point before the bombs went off injuring three bystanders.

A military post in northern Burkina Faso close to the borders with Mali was the target of a coordinated assault early this morning. At least 11 Burkinabe soldiers and one gendarme were killed in the attack, which was attributed to jihadists. Reuters reported Friday’s attack about 19 miles from the Malian border began at around 5 a.m. local time and was carried out “by about 40 heavily armed individuals who have not yet been identified,” the army told them in a statement.

Suspected members of the Boko Haram sect on Monday laid an ambush between Sari and Gudumbali areas of Borno State, killing another Lieutenant Colonel, Otos Umusu, and his unnamed security aide while heading to their base in Baga. Our correspondent learnt that Umusu, who was the Commanding Officer of the 118 Task Force Battalion, Operation Lafiya Dole, in Borno, and his aide were killed by an Improvised Explosive Device planted on the road.

According to the report, the officer is O. Umusu, a lieutenant colonel and commanding officer, 118 Task Force in Borno state. He was killed alongside his security details, by an IED in an ambush Monday evening, December 12. O.Umusu and his security details were returning from Maiduguri to their location towards Baga, when the incident happened between Sari and Gudumbali.

Emerging reports suggest that a twin bomb blast has ripped through a market in Madagali town. Police say that about 10 people have been killed following the twin bomb attack. Madagali lies some 276 km from the Adamawa State capital, Yola.The town, which is close to neighbouring Borno State, was one of several others held by Boko Haram at the height of the group’s brutal insurgency.

Algerian Defense Ministry on Monday said its troops seized a load of war weapons on the borderline with Mali. "Part of anti-terrorism efforts and border security, vigilant army troops discovered on Monday a bunker full of arms and ammunition in the southern province of Adrar, near the Malian border," the ministry said. The troops retrieved 20 Kalashnikov machine-guns, 13 ammunition boxes and 516 bullets of different calibers, it said.

Clashes between armed groups near the northern Malian city of Gao left at least one person dead and a dozen injured, and the local airport was closed after being hit in a jihadist attack, sources said.Fighting erupted on Thursday between the towns of Tessit and Intillit among unidentified militias, an elected official who asked not to named said. The combatants were believed either to be aligned with the ex-rebel Azawad movement or with an ethnic Touareg group called Imghad or its pro-government ally, the official said.

Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) has claimed two attacks that occurred yesterday which targeted the airports of Timbuktu and Gao in northern Mali. The jihadist group claimed a suicide attack in Gao, while a rocket barrage targeted a French base at the Timbuktu airport.In Gao, a suicide car bomb detonated at a checkpoint close to UN facilities at the airport. No one was killed in the blast, but nearby UN buildings were badly damaged. According to Reuters, the car bomb was able to make it past c

Thirty suspected Boko Haram militants died when the Nigerian army repelled an ambush of traveling government members near Bama, a local official said."We were traveling from Pulka to Maiduguri when militants attacked our convoy with improvised explosive devices and sporadic gunshots, just after [passing the village of] Ngurosoye, but the troops repelled them, killing up to 30 of the terrorists," said Saeed Salisu, chairmen of the government of Gwoza, in northeastern Borno state.

Two female bombers were thwarted as they tried to stage a double suicide attack in Cameroon’s Far North Thursday, with one blowing herself up and the second shot dead by troops, security sources said. “At around 7:30 am (0630 GMT), two young suicide bombers entered the town of Mora” with the aim of blowing themselves up, but they were identified, a military official told AFP.

Eight Cameroonian soldiers were this afternoon wounded when their vehicle hit a land mine in Zamga, Far North Region of Cameroon.

At least five Malian soldiers and a civilian were killed in separate attacks aimed at sabotaging Mali’s municipal elections, security forces said on Monday.The West African country went to the polls on Sunday in its first election since 2013. Voters are electing 12,000 councillors across Mali as the government wrestles with implementing a 2015 peace deal with militant groups. The nation has suffered from ongoing attacks by various armed groups despite a UN-led international military intervention.

At least eleven Boko Haram fighters were killed Saturday as troops of Nigeria’s 103 battalion destroyed a market cum camp operated by the terrorist sect in northern Borno, people familiar with the matter have told PREMIUM TIMES.An unconfirmed number of terrorists were also wounded during the battle in Yale, about eight kilometres south of Bama and 12 kilometres south west of Dikwa, while arms, ammunition and other equipment were recovered, military insiders said.