Unknown Gunmen Kill Soldiers at Benue, Taraba Border

By George Okoh in Makurdi

Unknown gunmen at the early hours of yesterday morning attacked soldiers on patrol at a border town the Tseke, in Kante-Chenkai between Benue and Taraba States, killing two soldiers, while two others were abducted.

  The soldiers’ patrol vehicle was destroyed.

A source in the area disclosed  that some of the soldiers escaped with serious injuries.

According to the source, “That community is a Tiv-Jukun settlement and it is a border community where you can hardly draw a border line between Benue and Taraba States.

“From what we have gathered so far, two of the soldiers were killed, some where taken alive and one of their patrol vehicles was also burnt.

“Though we had that some of the soldiers were still unaccounted for which means that the casualty figure might be higher when the true picture of the attack becomes clearer.”

Confirming the report, the Chairman of Logo Local Government Area, Mr. Richard Nyajo, said the incident happened at around 7a.m. yesterday.

He said herdsmen were responsible for the attack.

“I gave them a base at Mbagegh council ward of Logo Local Government. So in the course of carrying out their peacekeeping operation around the border area, they went into the bush and I don’t know whether the herdsmen heard about them, they came behind and entangled them and opened fire on them.

“They burnt one of their patrol vehicles, injured some of them, took some alive and killed one person but the second person was seriously injured and might not make it alive because he was in bad shape.

“Though one was said to be missing but by tomorrow we will get a clearer picture of the situation, including the actual number of deaths because when an attack scatters a group of people like it happened and some are missing, you cannot just conclude on the casualty figure.”

He added: “But surely some were killed and some were abducted. Though many among those that were missing escaped alive. But by tomorrow we will get a clearer picture of the situation.”

All efforts to confirm the incident from the police and military source were unsuccessful.