NEWSNIGERIA7 HOURS AGO

Boko Haram attack on Nigeria oil team killed over 50
Details emerging from Tuesday's ambush in northeast Nigeria suggest the death toll is higher than initially reported.

The army said Wednesday that 10 people were killed in the attack but sources say the number is much higher and rising [File: Stephanie Yas/AFP/Getty]
More than 50 people were killed in a Boko Haram ambush on an oil exploration team in northeast Nigeria earlier this week, multiple sources told AFP news agency on Thursday, warning the death toll could rise.

Tuesday's attack in the Magumeri area of Borno state on a convoy of specialists from the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) was the group's deadliest in months.

It underscored the persistent threat posed by Boko Haram fighters, despite government claims they are a spent force, and also the risks associated with the hunt for crude in the volatile Lake Chad basin.

Details of the ambush, which was initially thought to be a kidnapping attempt, have been slow to emerge and an exact death toll difficult to establish, as the military strictly controls access to rural Borno.

READ MORE: Northern Nigeria - Refuge for IDPs fleeing Boko Haram

Telecommunications and other infrastructure have been severely damaged or destroyed in the conflict, which has left at least 20,000 dead and more than 2.6 million homeless since 2009.

The army said on Wednesday that 10 people were killed in the attack.

But one source involved in dealing with the aftermath told AFP news agency on Thursday: "The death toll keeps mounting. Now we have more than 50... and more bodies are coming in."

"It's clear that the attack wasn't for abduction. They (Boko Haram) attacked just to kill."

Missing university staff



An aid agency worker in Magumeri, which is 50 kilometres northwest of Maiduguri, said 47 bodies were recovered from the bush as of Wednesday evening.

"Eleven of them were badly burned in the attack. They were burned alive in their vehicle, which was stuck in a trench," he added.

"We buried them here because they couldn't be taken to Maiduguri.

"This evening (Thursday), six more bodies were recovered, including one soldier, and many more could be recovered because search and rescue teams are all over the place."


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A medical source at the Nigerian Army 7th Division headquarters at Maimalari barracks in Maiduguri said: "So far we have 18 dead soldiers. Ten were brought yesterday and eight more today."

At the University of Maiduguri Teaching Hospital (UMTH), a medical worker said: "We have 19 bodies at the moment of civilians.

"Fifteen of them were vigilantes (civilian militia), and four were staff from the university. They have been taken for burial."

The head of the academic staff union at the University of Maiduguri, Dani Mamman, confirmed they had received four bodies and said two of them were academics.

"We got the impression our staff on the team were rescued because that was what the military spokesman said yesterday," he added.

"But we were shocked when we were given four dead bodies. This means it wasn't a rescue. We still have other staff that are yet to be accounted for."

Hospital and army officials told the local Punch newspaper that the corpses of 18 soldiers and 30 others had been brought to a facility in Maiduguri following the incident.

The bodies brought to the hospital included 18 soldiers, 15 members of the Civilian Joint Task Force (JTF), a group of fighters to help expel Boko Haram, five local university staff and four NNPC drivers, Punch reported.

An ongoing threat

In a statement, Nigeria's junior oil minister and the former head of the NNPC Emmanuel Ibe Kachikwu described the attack as "unfortunate" but did not give a death toll.

OPEC-member Nigeria is looking to find new oil reserves away from the southern Niger Delta, which has been blighted by attacks from rebels wanting a fairer share of revenue for local people.

With production hit by the attacks, there has been a shift in focus to explore inland basins, including around Lake Chad in the northeast, where Nigeria meets Cameroon, Chad and Niger.

Both Chad and Niger are exploiting reserves on their side of the freshwater lake.

Activities on the Nigerian side had to stop in November 2014 because of Boko Haram violence, but the military gave permission to resume exploration in November last year, according to Kachikwu.

Work is centred on a triangle of hotly contested land stretching from Gubio in the west of Borno to Marte in the east, and Kukawa, in the far northeast corner near the shores of the lake.

OPINION: Is another Boko Haram in the making?

There has been no serious suggestion that Boko Haram is motivated by a desire to control oil in northeast Nigeria.

But fighters, squeezed out of captured territory by the military counterinsurgency, may have been eager to make a show of force against the soldiers and civilian militia guarding the NNPC team.

In recent months, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) group affiliate has been forced to rely on guerilla tactics, particularly suicide bomb attacks, against the security forces and civilian militia.

Women and young girls, in particular, have been used against civilian "soft" targets such as mosques, as well as the university in Maiduguri.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/07/boko-haram-attack-nigeria-oil-team-killed-50-170727235033498.html

That's a bad news.

Were they there without security?

Making decisions based on information provided by government this days can be dangerous o.

Everyone has to think it through before working based on information provided by the crop of government officials we have in Nigeria.

They lie indiscriminately.

Boko men are still active. It just the media that has been shut out.

Perhaps it isn't the case but from my sideline perspective, Nigeria is too trusting. Nigeria should trust none of her so called allies for if there's one thing I've learned from Naiaraland is that unlike Nigerians, Africans are generally as sneaky, two-faced and unreliable as whites. Say what you like about Nigeria and Nigerians, one thing I know is Nigerians won't betray other Africans for the sake of oyigbo or his favours!

This is Fake News.Bokoharam is fully defeated!!!

Boko haram should not disturb fg as they Do not have their time again.... The only concern of fg is ipob....

Zoological Republic

And another thing, those officers that lead the fight against Bokoharam untill recently should be brought back. I believe they sent one to go head the coalition forces in njemina etc, anyway not sure of thire names or if I'm right, but if a new officer is now running the show, he isn't doing such a good job.

Where are all the people who screamed

The Nigerian Army has over the years demonstrated a higher level of commitment to the Nigerian State and its citizens by continuously discharging its constitutional mandates of protecting its territories and bringing domestic peace and normalcy in aid of civil authority .The order by our number soldier is certainly achievable and as citizens we have to team up and give our gallant troops all necessary moral and other support to capture not only shekau but all those individuals siding the terror groups. We have the conviction that those responsible for the killings and displacement of innocent citizens will be exposed and disgraced here on earth and in the next world. God doesn't like unjust especially killings which He condemns and hates and promised to punish those engaged in murder. This group calls on all Boko Haram members to surrender as your activities,philosophies and ideologies are not in any way in tandem with civility not to talk of any religious inclination. Your activities are self saving and benefits only the leaders of the group who leave in affluence and their rank and file in abject malnutrition and poverty. Your end has come by special grace of God. Follow the wisdom of some of you who wishfully surrendered so that you can have mercy of God here on earth and in the next world. May The Lord show you the right path and follow it for your own good before it is late , because death can conquer you any time without notice. In Nigeria we trust .

the actual death toll is close to 70...


this latest case is simply caused by the insensitivity of this present 'regime' all in a bid to be seen as making more progress than what is actually on ground...


in a bid to show that they have 'defeated' BH so that they can continue with their propaganda, they are endangering the lives of innocent Nigerians.


a lot of places in those areas that this administration claims are safe, still have a strong presence of BH fighters, not enough to hold the town, but enough to create havoc on a regular basis.


they have to realise that this insurgency will not be won by deceiving people for cheap political gains, no doubt the military is making progress, but it should not be blown so out of proportion that it makes innocent people take wrong decisions by going to these dangerous places when they have no need to do so at the time.


may God grant us leaders who would not use the lives of innocent people to replace the blood of 'dogs & baboons'...

There was no rescue as falsely claimed and circulated by the useless nijeriyan army.

What I do know is that the dead bodies picture as casualties in the purported rescue attempt by the Nigerian security forces where actually those killed during the Boko Haram attack on the convoy.

Right now as I type this nobody including that brute Buruntai in the Nigerian security circles knows the whereabouts of the kidnapped NNPC and UNIMAID staff.