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| Boko Haram leader, Shekau |
The military authorities announced on Tuesday that a high-value target in the Boko Haram war has been captured by the police in Ondo State.
The Director of Army Public Relations, Brig.-Gen. Sani Kukasheka, made the announcement in a statement in Maiduguri.
According to the spokesman, Idris Ibrahim Babawo, a top Boko Haram commander, is identified as number 156 in the Boko Haram wanted list.
Babawo, 42, who also goes by the name Idoko or Nagada, was captured while trying to evade arrest.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the capture indicates that the renewed push by the military to clear the insurgents from the North East is yielding dividends.
Kukasheka said that the militant had since been handed over to the military.
“The Ondo State Command of the Nigeria Police on Sept. 24 at about 2: 00 p.m., arrested a wanted Boko Haram terrorist, Idris Ibrahim Babawo, believed to be number 156 on the wanted Boko Haram terrorists list.
“He was handed over to the 32 Brigade, 2 Division, Nigerian Army at about 2:00 p.m. on Sept. 25 by the Ondo State Police Command.”
Kukasheka said that preliminary investigations showed that the terrorist hailed from Chinade village in the Katagum Local Government Area of Bauchi State.
He said that Babawo escaped from the North-East because of what he described as sustained military onslaught on the jihadists.
Boko Haram staged a bloody insurgency in northern Nigeria in 2009 in a bid to establish an Islamic Caliphate.
But the military has decimated the group, forcing the insurgents to resort to attacking mainly soft targets in parts of northern Nigeria.
At least 2.7 million people have been displaced by the insurgency, especially in Borno and Adamawa States, the epicentre of the bloody campaign.
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