Nigerian soldiers have killed about 30 suspected members of Boko Haram, including a close associate of the group’s leader, during a gun battle in northeastern Yobe state, an army spokesman says.
“About 30 suspected Boko Haram terrorists were killed in the battle which lasted several hours,” Lieutenant Eli Lazarus, an army spokesman, said in a statement on Sunday.
Troops of the Joint Task Force (JTF) “engaged in a gun battle with the suspected terrorists” during a search-and-cordon operation on Boko Haram’s hideout in Kandahar and around cemetery areas of Damaturu, the state capital, the statement said.