-Two Soldiers Dead, Two SSS Operatives Injured
AMBUSHED by a crack team of State Security Service personnel and Nigerian Army soldiers on Saturday, nine members of a terrorist group suspected to be members of the vicious Islamic sect, Boko Haram, were killed in a major shoot-out in Okene, Kogi State.
The government agents who acted on a tip from undisclosed sources suffered casualties, with the army losing two of its men in the exchange while two SSS men were injured.
The suspects had been traced to a location near Idoma, in Kogi State, whereu the incoming security operatives had been fired upon, before the exchange of gunfire.
Army records commander, General Alphonsus Chukwu led the operation.
Some of the terrorists fled the scene for nearby hills after they came under heavy gunfire from the soldiers and the SSS operatives. An Air Force apache helicopter was called in to pursue the terrorists into the hills.
General Chukwu rejected the popular tag of Boko Haram given to the extremist group whose acts of mass murders in parts of northern Nigeria have intensified in recent months, saying that the members are simply terrorists.
“”We have gone beyond calling these people Boko Haram. These are terrorists.”
The general said that his men will not leave the location until the remaining members of the terror group there are located and held. He encouraged the residents to go about their normal business.
Explosive-making materials, hand-guns and even toy-guns were among other things secured and retrieved from the site.