Police arrest top Boko Haram commander in Borno

A suspected top Boko Haram commander, Ibrahim Diye, was arrested yesterday by the Police in Maiduguri metropolis, the Borno State capital, following a tip off from one of the residents.

A senior member of an “intelligence Police unit” along Airport road, who craved anonymity, because he was not authorised to speak on Diye’s arrest and interrogation, said: “I cannot disclose the location where the suspected top commander was arrested, as it may jeopardise further arrests of others.

“The information we had from residents helped us in tracking and arresting this suspect yesterday. He is cooperating with us.” He said that Diye, who was popularly known as Romeo among his peers of Boko Haram commanders, had threatened to assassinate the district head of Pulka, a border village with Cameroun and 116 kilometre southeast of Maiduguri.

“Diye, besides operating in the Pulka/Bita/Dure axis in Gwoza Council area, he had been terrorising some communities and villages in Sambisa Forest,” the Police officer added.

In a related development, troops of Operation Lafiya Dole also yesterday closed in on fleeing insurgents that attacked Mainok village on Wednesday in which two people were killed before the troops repelled the insurgents.

Mainok had been attacked several times in the last two years and it was reported that the village had been harbouring insurgents in the night along the 132-kilometere Maiduguri-Damaturu road.Intelligence report also indicated that the attackers fled to Zari border settlement of Mobbar Council of the state.