Armed men killed at least six civilians and five soldiers in an attack in Abia state, the military said Friday, prompting the state government to announce a N25million reward for information on the shooters.
The attack on Thursday was the latest in a series of raids in a region plagued by separatist violence.
According to defence spokesperson Major-General Edward Buba, the terrorists killed five soldiers posted as peacekeepers in the region, while six civilians were killed in the crossfire.
No group claimed responsibility, but the army blamed the outlawed separatist Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) movement which wants the surrounding region to secede from Nigeria.
The attack was at a military checkpoint at Obikabia junction in Obingwa local government area, Buba said in a statement.
“The military will be fierce in its response. We will bring overwhelming military pressure on the group to ensure their total defeat,” he said.
Abia information commissioner Prince Okey Kanu advised the military to exercise moderation in their response.
The military has previously been accused by rights groups of deploying excessive force and killing innocent civilians in response to similar attacks, which it rejects.
The turmoil in the southeast has added to the burden on the government and military, which are already dealing with bombings and kidnappings in the northwest, a 15-year-old Islamist insurgency in the northeast, and sectarian and herder-farmer confrontations in central regions.
IPOB fights for the secession of Southeastern Nigeria, where the majority of the population is Igbo.
The movement’s leader, Nnamdi Kanu, a British citizen captured in Kenya in 2021, is currently on trial in Nigeria on terrorism charges.
More than a million people died, largely from starvation, during a three-year civil war in the late 1960s when the region attempted to separate as the Republic of Biafra.
