France blocks websites accused of condoning terrorism

Source: Aljazeera

France has blocked five websites accused of condoning terrorism, in the first use of new government powers that came into force in February, the interior ministry said on Monday.

Breaking News: Boko Haram Leader - Shekau Formerly Proclaims ‘Islamic Caliphate’ in Nigeria

KANO ( AFP) – Boko Haram’s leader said he has created an Islamic caliphate in a northeast Nigeria town seized by the insurgents earlier this month, in a video obtained by AFP on Sunday.

“Thanks be to Allah who gave victory to our brethren in (the town of) Gwoza and made it part of the Islamic caliphate,” Abubakar Shekau said in the 52-minute video.

He declared that Gwoza, in Borno state, now has “nothing to do with Nigeria”.
“By the grace of Allah we will not leave the town. We have come to stay,” said Shekau, who has been designated a global terrorist by the United States and sanctioned by the UN Security Council.
The United Nations humanitarian office (OCHA) earlier this month confirmed reports that Gwoza was under Insurgent's control.

Boko Haram is also believed to be in control of other areas near Gwoza in southern Borno, as well as large
swathes of territory in northern Borno and at least one town in neighbouring Yobe state.

Mapping the precise areas which have fallen into Islamist hands is nearly impossible.
There are few humanitarian workers on the ground in the northeast, travel is dangerous and the region, which
has been under a state of emergency since May of last year, has poor mobile phone coverage.

Experts have described Boko Haram’s gains in recent weeks as unprecedented, saying the group was closer than ever to achieving its goal of carving out a strict Islamic state across northern Nigeria.

Source:

Vanguard

Boko Haram On The Brink Of Creating A Caliphate In Northern Nigeria

Daring advances by Boko Haram suggests the Islamic Sect may be on the brink of achieving its goal of creating an Islamic Caliphate in northern Nigeria. Analysts are however of the view that comparisons to the Iraq crisis are premature and the military can reverse the group’s gains.

The conflict in the Islamists’ northeastern stronghold remains in flux even as witnesses, security sources and experts report that the insurgents have seized several areas and towns since April.

Precisely mapping the areas captured by the extremists— who are blamed for more than 10,000 deaths since their uprising began in 2009 — is near impossible.

The northeast, under a state of emergency since May last 2013, has poor mobile phone coverage, travel is
dangerous and the military has restricted the flow of information.

The United Nations has confirmed reports that the towns of Damboa and Gwoza in Borno State were under
rebel control earlier this month, although Damboa may have since been retaken.
On Thursday, witnesses and an official in Buni Yadi in neighbouring Yobe state said that town had also been seized.

Ryan Cummings, chief Africa analyst at the South Africa-based crisis management group Red 24, described Boko Haram’s shift from guerrilla-style hit-and-run tactics as “a significant evolution” and predicted the trend would continue.

Virginia Comolli of the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London added that the group was “in control” of northern Borno, which is consistent with residents’ accounts.
She said that the group had captured and held territory before but “now we are looking at a more extended area”.
“They have a real shot of achieving their goal” of creating a strict Islamic state in the north, she added.

Military Weakness -
While the rebels have grown stronger, secured powerful new weapons and refreshed their ranks with new conscripts, military failures are largely to blame for the worsening crisis, multiple sources said.
“For whatever reason, our soldiers, who are capable of defeating Boko Haram terrorists, were starved of the
necessary weapons,” said a senior security source in Borno’s capital Maiduguri.
He noted that Boko Haram had taken over larges swathes of northern Borno before May last year.

When the state of emergency was declared, the military launched a massive offensive which temporarily flushed the rebels from their strongholds. But said the security source, top brass failed to sustain the pressure.

Boko Haram “would have been completely crushed had the tempo of the offensive been sustained”, he told AFP.
“I assure you it will not take much effort to crush them if provided with the needed weapons,” he added.
Lack of arms for troops has become a flashpoint issue, and soldiers this week refused to deploy to Gwoza without better weapons in an apparent mutiny.

Nigeria is Africa’s largest oil producer and top economy and some observers have put the defence budget at roughly $6 billion (4.5 billion euros) per year.
If troops are chronically ill-equipped, corruption and inefficiency are the likely causes, rather than a lack of
resources, experts say.

Most agree that force alone cannot end the five-year conflict and must be coupled with major economic
development in the desperately poor northeast.

Not ‘Islamic State’ -
In a July video, Boko Haram’s leader Abubakar Shekau voiced support for Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the head of
the Islamic State (IS) extremists who have captured parts of Iraq and Syria and claimed the grisly execution
of US journalist James Foley.
The mention of Baghdadi was unusual for Shekau, who in videos often appears completely detached from current events.

Jacob Zenn, an analyst at the US-based Jamestown Foundation, said there were similarities between IS and Boko Haram, notably their shocking levels of brutality.
Boko Haram has among other crimes massacred thousands of defenceless civilians, opened fire on students sleeping in their dorms, kidnapped hundreds of children, including more than 200 schoolgirls from the
town of Chibok in April.

But while the United States has described IS as “beyond anything” it has seen in terms of funding, weaponry and strategic sophistication, Boko Haram is largely made up of poor, uneducated youths with almost no tactical training. Though the group is thought to have ties to outside jihadi groups but the extent of those links is not clear.

Boko Haram “has not reached that level of sophistication”, Comolli told AFP, referring to IS, but said Shekau’s mention of Baghdadi was noteworthy.
Boko Haram, she said, is “watching what is going on”.

Vanguard Newspaper

Boko Haram Kills 34 in Fresh Attacks in Bornu State

TERRORISTS have raided three villages and killed those they accused of being anti-Boko Haram vigilantes in Borno State, according to the British Broadcasting Corporation.

While the BBC reported that more than 30 people were killed in the early hours of Friday, other sources put the casualty figure at 34.

Residents from two of the villages that came under attack said militants had arrived in a convoy and gathered the men of the community together.

They accused them of being members of vigilante groups and killed them all, one villager from Moforo in Marte district who escaped across the border to Cameroon told the BBC Hausa Service.

They then burnt down all the shops in the market, leaving the villagers destitute, he said.

Correspondents say that most villages have formed vigilante groups to try to protect their communities from militant attacks.

A resident of Kimba village in Biu district said the villagers contacted the security forces to alert them to their attack, but were told it was not an area under military control so they could not be helped.

The military has not commented on the allegation.

A local Mallam Umar Kimba told Saturday Tribune in Maiduguri, on Friday, that everybody in the village had fled to seek refuge in Sabon Gari while others fled to Mandara, Girau and Biu. According to him, the attackers,who came on motorcycles on Thursday night started firing sporadically before setting the town ablaze.

He added that, as they were firing, they were calling on youths in the village to come out and join in the jihad against the government of infidel and corrupt politicians. “When nobody went out to meet them they started burning the houses and those who hide in their houses started coming out and running to safe heaven, but the attackers fired at the people. I left Sabon Gari this morning but we have taken the wounded to hospital in Biu before I left.”

He also said what baffled them was that, there were military formation around that area but wondered how the insurgents managed to bypass all the military and attacked the village.

“They did not touch the house of the village head and security operatives came only when they had burnt everything and chased everybody out of the village.” he said.

About 25 men were killed in Moforo, another eight men in Kimbi. It is not known if there were casualties from a raid early on Friday on Kabrihu village near the Sambisa forest.

Source:
Nigerian Tribune