MAIDUGURI, Nigeria (AP) - Three militaries, using ground troops and
warplanes, fought Boko Haram on at least two fronts Wednesday with
hundreds of the Islamic fighters
reported dead as the conflict took on a
growing international perspective.
Chad's army said its troops were
attacked Tuesday in Cameroon by Boko Haram, the Nigerian extremist
group that has slaughtered and kidnapped civilians and has had the upper
hand against Nigeria's military. The Chadian troops' response
underscores other African nation's newfound resoluteness to combat what
they perceive as a regional threat.
"Our
valiant forces responded vigorously, a chase was immediately instituted
all the way to their base at Gamboru and Ngala (in Nigeria), where they
were completely wiped out," spokesman Col. Azem Bermendoa said on
national television Tuesday night.
More than 200 extremists and nine Chadian troops were killed, he said.
On
Wednesday, hundreds of Boko Haram fighters driven out of Gamboru
crossed the border and attacked Chadian military posts in Fotokol, in
far northern Cameroon, residents and military officers said.
Cameroonian
troops mobilized to join the Chadians in confronting the invaders,
resident journalist Ledoux Blaise Mal Moussa told The Associated Press
by telephone. The ongoing battle was confirmed by Cameroonian military
officers who spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not
authorized to speak to reporters. Most Fotokol residents had weeks ago
fled the town which Boko Haram was using to resupply.
Meanwhile, warplanes from
Nigeria and jet fighters and helicopter gunships from Chad pursued a
bombing campaign that has forced the Islamic fighters from more than a
dozen towns in northeast Nigeria where Boko Haram declared an Islamic
caliphate in August.
This week's military actions mark the biggest
offensive against Boko Haram in its more than five-year history and
come as Nigerians prepare to vote in presidential elections Feb. 14 that
are expected to be very close.
African Union officials were
meeting Wednesday in Cameroon to finalize a mandate for a 7,500-strong
multinational force from Nigeria and its four francophone neighbors to
confront the extremists who in recent months have seized more than 130
towns and villages. Those population centers lie in three of Nigeria's
northeastern states bordering Cameroon, Chad and Niger. Boko Haram has
held many of the towns for as long as six months.
The
Nigerian jets had started their bombing runs on Monday in Nigeria's
Sambisa Forest, where the extremists have camps and first took nearly
300 kidnapped schoolgirls last April, witnesses said.
"At night we
hear distant sounds of explosions," Bulama Danbayo said by telephone
from Madagali town in Adamawa state. "We were all terrified but some of
the soldiers stationed here told us not to be worried, that it was
soldiers that commenced bombardment of Sambisa Forest."
Nigeria's
spokesman on the insurgency, Mike Omeri, said in a statement Tuesday
that Nigerian forces this week have "liberated from Boko Haram presence"
more than a dozen towns.
"This is one of many severe blows delivered to the terrorists, with more to come," he told the AP in a statement.
Nigerian
and Chadian military officials said they have recovered heavy weapons
from Boko Haram including three armored cars, a dozen pickup trucks
armed with anti-aircraft and submachine guns, and a 105mm recoilless
cannon. Boko Haram captured such weapons from the Nigerian military.
The
presence of foreign troops on Nigerian soil does not compromise the
sovereignty of Africa's most populous nation and its biggest oil
producer, the Defense Ministry spokesman, Maj. Gen. Chris Olukolade,
said this week.
Still, Nigeria has been ambivalent and embarrassed
by the need for foreign troops. The commander of one Chadian infantry
battalion on the border, Maliki Aboubakarim, told the AP that their job
will be more difficult if Nigeria does not give them carte blanche for
hot-pursuit raids across the border, implying such permission is being
granted piecemeal.
___
Faul
reported from Dakar, Senegal. Associated Press writers Moki Edwin
Kindzeka in Yaounde, Cameroon, and Dany Padire in N'Ddjamena, Chad,
contributed to this report.
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