By Attah Ede
At least 70 suspected terrorists, including three commanders, have been neutralized following a military clearance operation carried out by troops of Operation Hadin Kai within the Timbuktu Triangle in the North East theatre.
The Director of Defence Media Operations, Maj-Gen. Edward Buba disclosed this in a statement on Sunday in Abuja.
He lamented that during the operation, 22 soldiers were killed while many others sustained various degrees of injuries.
General Buba noted that the three-prong operation aimed at dismantling the terrorist presence within triangle commenced on 16 Jan 25 till date.
According to him, the troops met several encounters with terrorists during the course of the clearance operations which resulted in over 70 terrorists including 3 notable terrorist commanders neutralized.
“The terrorist commanders neutralised include and are not limited to the following: TALHA (Terrorist Special Forces Commander), Mallam UMAR (Terrorist Operations commander) and ABU YAZEED (Terrorist Brigade Commander).
He revealed that during the action, the terrorists deployed Improvised Explosive Devices( IEDs), Person Borne Improvised Explosive Devices (suicide bombers) as well as Vehicle Borne Improvised Explosive Devices (suicide bombers in explosive vehicles) to ward off troops’ advance and attacks.
“Troops already familiar with the terrorist tactics thwarted the several terrorist attempts, including shooting down the amateur drones used by the terrorist”.
“Overall, during the course of the operations, troops sadly recorded 22 killed in action casualties with several others wounded in action.
“On this account, the media is enjoined to resist publishing names of troop casualties to allow the formal notification of their next of kin
