Boko Haram leader killed as Kerry visits Nigeria

PanARMENIAN.Net - Nigeria reported Tuesday, August 23 that the leader of Boko Haram and several of his top commanders were killed or wounded in an airstrike, just as Secretary of State John F. Kerry arrived in the West African nation with a message that military action alone won’t break the terrorist outfit’s grip on the region, The Washington Times reports.

“Beating Boko Haram on the battlefield is only the beginning,” said Kerry, who called on Nigeria to “strike at the root causes of violent extremism” by more aggressively fighting rampant corruption in the government, as well as policies of marginalization and inequality that the terrorists have exploited to recruit followers.

His comments drew loud applause, but it was too early to determine how the message would resonate with Nigerian leaders, who have spent months pushing Washington to ease arms sales restrictions that the Obama administration has kept in place amid concern over corruption and human rights abuses.

The Nigerian military offered few details on what types of planes or bombs were used in the Tuesday strike, but said the air force carried out a “most unprecedented and spectacular air raid” that killed about 300 militants and “fatally wounded” the group’s leader, Abubakar Shekau.

Nigerian officials have claimed on at least three occasions that they have killed or fatally wounded Shekau — only to have him resurface weeks or months later in video recordings. Two statements by the military Tuesday did not give the basis for the latest claim but identified several other of the terrorist group’s commanders as “confirmed dead.”