Sallah tragedy: Boko Haram raids IDP camp, stabs 18 to death

Boko Haram terrorists have killed 18 people on Friday in a raid on a camp for civilians displaced by the group’s violent insurgency.

The knife-wielding attackers, moving under cover of night, invaded the camp in Banki on Nigeria’s border with Cameroon, which camps over 45,000 internally displaced people (IDP), using knives to kill their victims silently.

“At around 12:30 am (2330 GMT Thursday) this morning some Boko Haram terrorists broke the barricade securing the IDP camp from the rear towards the Cameroon border and entered to seize food from IDPs,” a senior military officer told newsmen on Friday.

“They killed 11 IDPs and wounded two in the attack,” said the military officer who would not want his name mentioned.

Adamu Ahmad, a member of a civilian militia charged with protecting the Banki camp, confirmed the incident.

He said the attackers used knives to kill their victims instead of firearms to avoiding alerting soldiers at a military base adjacent to the camp, Ahmad said.

The raiders also stole food aid rations given to those living in the camp, said the military officer.

Boko Haram is reported to be running desperately low on supplies after Nigerian security forces successfully cut off supply lines to the group’s bases.

The attack on Banki left 18 dead, according to Modu Perobe, a member of the Civilian Joint Task Force, a regional vigilante group.