U.S. and Nigerian forces killed a pacesetter of the Islamic State group in Nigeria in a mission carried out Friday, U.S. President Donald Trump stated.
Trump introduced the joint operation in Africa’s most populous nation in a late-night social media submit that supplied few particulars. He stated Abu Bakr al-Mainuki was second-in-command of the Islamic State group globally and “thought he might conceal in Africa, however little did he know we had sources who stored us knowledgeable on what he was doing.”
Al-Mainuki was seen as the important thing determine in IS organizing and finance, and had been plotting assaults towards america and its pursuits, in keeping with an official who spoke on situation of anonymity as a result of they weren’t approved to share delicate info.
Nigerian President Bola Tinubu confirmed the operation and stated Al-Mainuki was killed alongside “a number of of his lieutenants, throughout a strike on his compound within the Lake Chad Basin.”
Born in Nigeria’s Borno province in 1982, al-Mainuki took the helm of the IS department in West Africa after the group’s earlier chief within the area, Mamman Nur, was killed in 2018, in keeping with the Counter Extremism Mission, which tracks militant teams.
Al-Mainuki was primarily based within the Sahel space, the monitoring group stated, including that it’s believed that he fought in Libya when IS was energetic within the North African nation greater than a decade in the past. He was sanctioned by the U.S. in 2023.
U.S. and Nigeria step up joint operations
The Nigerian navy stated the operation was a results of just lately shaped U.S.-Nigeria partnership and intelligence-sharing efforts. Samalia Uba, the navy spokesperson, stated in an announcement that the operation has additionally “disrupted a violent terrorist community that endangered Nigeria and the broader West African area.”
Nigeria has been battling a number of armed teams, together with no less than two affiliated with IS, because it has grappled with a multifaceted safety disaster. IS associates in Africa have emerged as a number of the continent’s most energetic militant teams following the collapse of the so-called IS caliphate in Syria and Iraq in 2017.
The U.S. in February despatched troops to the West African nation to assist advise its navy, and in March, the U.S. additionally deployed drones there after Trump alleged that Christians are being focused in Nigeria’s safety disaster.
The Friday evening operation was the most recent occasion in a string of covert missions overseas that Trump has introduced this 12 months, beginning with the gorgeous in a single day raid in January to seize and take away Venezuela’s then-leader Nicolás Maduro and whisk him to the U.S., adopted almost two months later by the launch of strikes that kicked off the struggle with Iran.
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Adetayo reported from Lagos, Nigeria. Related Press writers Konstantin Toropin in Washington and Samy Magdy in Cairo contributed to this report.
