The Nigerian Army has given reasons why soldiers invaded a UN humanitarian camp in Maiduguri on Friday.
A UN staff has said the soldiers invade the camp early Friday to carry out a search operation.
In a statement issued by Lt. Col. Kingsley Samuel, the army said it carried out a search on the property because it had credible intelligence that some Boko Haram insurgents had infiltrated the area.
He added that no arrest was made during the search.
“As part of ongoing counter insurgency operations, the theatre command Operation Lafiya Dole has been conducting several clearance as well as cordon and search operations in urban and rural areas within the theatre. The clearance operations effort has been yielding several successes,” he said in a statement.
“It has forced the Boko Haram terrorists (BHTs) to change tactics and resort to employment of suicide bombers to target military locations and the populace. This necessitated the need to intensify cordon and search in Maiduguri metropolis and environment.
“In the last one week cordon and search operations were conducted in Jiddari –Polo, Muna Garage, Jakana amongst several other areas. On 10th August 2017, theatre command received information from one of its credible sources that some high value BHT suspects had infiltrated into Pompomari Bye-Pass.
“It, therefore, became expedient to take pre-emptive action by combing the general area through a cordon and search operations. The operation was successfully conducted as over 30 houses were searched. One of such included a property which was said to be occupied by United Nations staff, although the property did not carry a UN designation. On the whole, operation in the general area was successfully concluded but no arrest was made because the suspects were not found.”
