The bodies of five soldiers were dismembered by suspected
cultists in Essien Udim LGA of Akwa Ibom state.
The Cable quoting military sources said the soldiers were
part of the joint operation Delta Safe deployed in the area.
In the past weeks, there has been a series of attacks by
gunmen, especially on security personnel in the area.
As part of its efforts to curb the attacks, the military had
sent in troops, but the attacks continued.
On Tuesday, however, the military returned with heavy force
to comb the area.
Senior military officers who spoke on Wednesday said about 10
soldiers had gone missing, before the troops went back and “found five bodies
from those missing”.
“The military had to storm the area, and this time, with air
strikes when about 10 of our soldiers got kidnapped,” one of the sources said.
“We flushed the
criminals out, and while ground troops were combing the area, we found bodies
of our soldiers, dismembered. It was shocking. We put their bodies together.”
Another source added that they ensured “no civilian was
killed in the operation”.
Mohammed Yerima, army spokesperson, in a statement, said the
suspected criminals were neutralised in the air strikes.
“The miscreants exploited various avenues to acquire weapons
to perpetrate their heinous crimes. In the past few weeks, the group has
attacked various security agencies which resulted in the loss of lives and
carting away of weapons. The last incident led to the killing of some Policemen
including a CSP,” he said.
“The hoodlums
continued to terrorise law abiding citizens through extortions and infringement
on their rights.
“Consequently a combined team of Military and Security
Agencies in the State conducted a clearance operation at Ntak Ikot Akpan to in
order to flush out the miscreants.
“The operation was successfully executed and resulted in the
dislodgement of the criminals while fleeing hoodlums were neutralised by the
Air Component.”
As against reports that there is still crisis in the area,
Yerima said normalcy has been restored while the police have assumed full
control and carried out normal duties.
He asked members of the public not to panic but to remain
calm and continue to support the security agencies.
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