Two Nigerian soldiers killed in Adamawa attack

Two Nigerian Soldiers were killed in clashes with jihadists in northeast Nigerian Adamawa state, militia sources and residents said on Saturday. Jihadists in several trucks stormed into Garkida late Friday and attacked troops guarding the town in a gun battle that forced residents to flee into surrounding mountains.

“Two soldiers were killed in the fighting which sent (people) fleeing into the mountains overlooking the town,” militia leader Bitrus Andrew said. No group claimed responsibility for the attack but it appeared to have the hallmarks of the Islamic State West Africa (ISWAP) group. The jihadists struck around 1800 GMT, setting fire to a Christian seminary and several vehicles including two ambulances belonging to a public hospital, said Garkida resident Abdullahi Isah who gave the same toll.

No civilians were hurt in the attack as all the residents fled the town during the fighting, the sources said. “It was after the insurgents chased the soldiers out of the town that they carried out the arson and left,” Isah said. Garkida is some 165 kilometres (100 miles) north of the state capital, Yola, and near the state border with Borno, which has been worst affected by a decade of Boko Haram violence. The jihadist violence has killed 36,000 people and displaced around two million from their homes in the northeast since 2009. The conflict has spilled into neighbouring Niger, Chad and Cameroon, prompting a regional military coalition to fight the jihadists. Vanguard