Troops of Operation Lafiya Dole have rescued 797 held captives with the killing of 35 Boko Haram terrorists on Monday in the Cameroonian border areas of Borno state. The captives were rescued in five border villages of Kusha-Kucha, Surdewala, Alkanerik, Magdewerne and Mayen with Cameroon in the Northeast. Deputy Director Public Relations of Theatre Command Operations, Colonel Onyema Nwachukwu disclosed this on Tuesday in a statement issued to journalists in Maiduguri. He said the rescued hostages held by insurgents in the border villages, comprise 209 children, 121 women and three men. According to him, troops also recovered a cache of arms and tools from Boko Haram insurgents in the Sabil Huda enclave of Sambisa Forest. He further disclosed that troops, also killed 33 terrorists, with the destruction of 15 locally fabricated rifles captured from them. He said the rescued people will be conveyed to Bama and Pulka towns for profiling, before handing them to Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) camp officials. On how insurgents were tracked in the border areas, Nwachukwu said: “As the clearance operations progressed, the combined troops tracked the terrorists to Boko, Daushe and Gave villages, where they unleashed another attack on the fleeing insurgents. “Two insurgents were killed in the fire fight and recovered an AK-47 rifle, a magazine, a trolley and unspecified quantity of premium motor spirit in jerry cans. “Troops also extricated 194 civilians held captive by the insurgents and destroyed makeshift accommodation erected by them.” According to him, after successfully clearing Miyanti and Wudila villages, the troops rescued three men, 121 women and 209 children. He said the rescued persons, is undergoing profiling and preparatory to their handover to appropriate IDP camps in Borno state.
