The Joint-military Task Force (JTF) in Kano on Sunday killed 14 suspected Islamist insurgents during a dawn raid on a house in Layin Yanawaki in Unguwa Uku area of Kano metropolis.
“This operation was conducted following a tip-off from our intelligence. You can see that there are over 10 of the terrorists all dead”, Iliyasu Abbah, an officer in the military task force dealing with Islamist rebels, said.
The JTF spokesman, Cpt. Ikedechi Iweha, told journalists on Sunday that soldiers attacked the home in Kano after a car fled a military checkpoint. Iweha said soldiers found weapons and a car loaded with explosives inside the home, which was later demolished.
Iweha said soldiers killed 14 suspected extremists.
He said, “14 of the suspected terrorists were shot dead and a number of arms and ammunition were recovered during an exchange of fire between the gunmen and the JTF.
“However, one member of the JTF was killed and another wounded in the process”.
The JTF spokesman added that the JTF recovered 14 Ak47, one pump action rifle, large quantity of Improvised Explosive Devices (IED) and a Golf car at the scene.
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He, however, did not give details of people arrested at the scene.
He said two buildings suspected to be the hideout of the terrorists were also destroyed in area by the JTF.
The operation near the ever-busy Zaria-Kano expressway started in the early hours of Sunday and lasted for more than three hours.
A witness, who asked not to be named, said he saw a woman and a child among the dead.
Security was stepped up in northern Nigerian cities this weekend to cope with an increased threat posed by Islamist groups during Christian holidays, when churches have been targeted by suicide bombers.
Western governments fear that ties with groups like al Qaeda’s North African wing are drawing Nigerian Islamists towards a more explicitly anti-Western agenda.
Such concerns have risen since France launched an operation in January to flush jihadist rebels out of northern Mali.
Al Qaeda-affiliated Nigerian group, Ansaru, said earlier this month it had killed seven foreign hostages seized on February 7 in Bauchi because of attempts to free them.
