By Adam Nossiter
MAIDUGURI,
Nigeria — Maiduguri, the major city in Nigeria’s northeast, came under
sustained attack from Boko Haram terrorists on Sunday morning, with officials
here calling it the group’s most audacious assault on the city to date.
This city of
over two million people was attacked beginning late Saturday night from at
least two directions by the militants from the Islamist insurgency, which
effectively controls the territory surrounding the city. Loud explosions were
heard in the center of the city, and small-arms fire and artillery in its
suburbs.
“Certainly this
is the most serious attack yet,” said Kashim Shettima, the governor of Borno
State, of which Maiduguri is the capital. “We faced a really existential
threat.”
By late Sunday
morning, the attack appeared to have been repulsed by the Nigerian military.
Officials said bombs dropped on insurgent positions had turned the tide of the
battle here, but there were reports that a major military installation in a
town to the north, Monguno, had fallen to the insurgents, with over 1,000
soldiers fleeing to the bush in the face of the attack.
Initial reports
suggested that civilian and military casualties were substantial. Witnesses
reported seeing hundreds of residents fleeing the suburbs and rushing toward
the city’s center. They also reported seeing some Nigerian troops moving away
from the fighting, as in numerous previous engagements with the Islamists.
“There’s a lot
of gunshots and explosions,” said a top official at the city’s leading hospital
who lives in the suburbs and asked not to be identified because he was not
authorized to speak to the press and did not want to jeopardize his job. “These
boys are trying to come into town.”
Source:
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