Saturday, July 8, 2017

Niger: Soldiers kill 14 civilians whom they mistook for terrorists

(Niamey) Soldiers in Niger have killed 14 unarmed civilians after mistaking them for Boko Haram terrorists during a patrol in the remote southeast of the country. It appears that Nigerien soldiers were patrolling a militarily restricted zone around the village of Abadam near Lake Chad on Wednesday afternoon when they opened fire on what turned out to be farmers. 

Abadam is a village located in the red zone and has been prohibited for a very long time. Any individual seen in the area is considered Boko Haram. Two of the dead were from Niger and the rest from neighbouring Nigeria, where Boko Haram is based and from which the jihadist group has sometimes carried out cross-border attacks into Niger, Cameroon and Chad. This huge mistake happened just days after the Terrorist Group killed 9 people and kidnapped 40 more in a attack on a village about 40 miles away. Which may help explain why the Niger troops had itchy trigger fingers.