Troops of the Nigerian Army’s 18 Brigade have rescued nine kidnapped victims and foiled multiple terrorist attacks across the Mariga and Rijau Local Government Areas of Niger State, according to a statement from the Brigade’s public relations office.
The successful operations, conducted between Monday and Wednesday this week, are part of intensified offensive actions against terrorists and other criminal elements within the Brigade’s Area of Responsibility.
Nine victims held by kidnappers in Mariga Local Government Area were freed by troops of the Nigerian Army Training Centre Admin Battalion deployed at Kotonkoro. The freed individuals were immediately handed over to Mariga Local Government authorities for documentation and reunification with their families.
This was contained in a statement signed by the Acting Assistant Director, Army Public Relations, HQ 18, Bida, Captain Adebayo Samuel Adewumi.
According to the statement, in a separate engagement on Wednesday, soldiers on a fighting patrol in the Warari general area of Rijau Local Government Area cleared a terrorist ambush. Exploitation of the area yielded seven motorcycles, one camel, 47 cattle and 18 sheep believed to have been rustled from surrounding communities.
The statement said that the recovered livestock were transferred to the appropriate civil authorities.
Adewumi also stated that on Monday, the Brigade’s Quick Response Force, working with troops of the 311 Artillery Regiment and the Chief of Army Staff Special Intervention Battalion X, intercepted an attempted terrorist infiltration of Inana Village at Majal and Tunga Bisallah villages, also in Rijau Local Government Area.
‘Acting on credible intelligence and maintaining an effective presence in the area, the troops intercepted the terrorists as they attempted to infiltrate the communities. On sighting the troops, the terrorists, who were mounted on motorcycles, fled towards the nearby forest. The troops engaged them, forcing them to abandon their equipment and motorcycles, while some of the fleeing terrorists were believed to have sustained gunshot wounds’, the statement read.
During the subsequent search of the contact area, troops recovered one AK-47 rifle, an empty magazine and assorted ammunition of different calibres; one motorcycle was seized intact while six others were destroyed on the spot.
The Commander of 18 Brigade praised the troops for their courage, resilience and professionalism, urging them to maintain the current operational tempo, remain vigilant and intensify efforts to degrade and dismantle terrorist and criminal networks operating in the state.
The Commander further directed the soldiers to continue drawing on information supplied by local communities to disrupt criminal activities and deny terrorists freedom of movement.
These latest successes come against a long record of insecurity in Niger State, which has repeatedly suffered mass abductions, banditry and cattle rustling.
Earlier this month, joint security forces freed 308 abductees, including 145 taken from Niger State, from camps within Kainji Lake National Park, in what authorities described as one of the largest single-day rescue operations on record.
The Brigade Commander linked the current gains to the Chief of Army Staff’s directive to dominate the battlespace, sustain offensive operations, and degrade terrorism and other criminal activities across the country.
He charged the troops to pursue and eliminate remaining criminal elements within the Brigade’s Area of Responsibility so that vulnerable communities can once again enjoy security of life and property.