By Gbemiga Olamikan
Troops of Armed Forces in collaborated with personnel of Department of State Services (DSS) have conducted a sting operation that culminated in the arrest of the leader of ISWAP terrorist group in charge of North Central and North West Zones. The said leader of ISWAP is currently in the custody as air interactions have been conducted on several enclaves of the terrorist leaders in the North West and North Central zones with much success.
This was revealed by Director of Defence Media Operations, Major General Edward Buba in Abuja. Major General Buba also said that the operations of the week in focus, resulted in 52 terrorists neutralized while 204 of them were arrested as Troops arrested 58 perpetrators of oil theft and rescued 234 kidnapped hostages.
He said troops in the South-South also denied the oil theft of the estimated sum of Six Hundred and Sixty-Eight Million Seven Hundred Thirty-One Thousand Naira (N668,731,000.00) only.
The Successes of the week also witnessed recovery of 46 assorted weapons and 148 assorted ammunition which is breakdown as follows: 30 AK47 rifles, 2 josef magnum pump action gun, one double barrel gun, 2 single barrel guns, 12 locally made pistols, 13 dane guns, one hand grenade, 9 locally made rifles, 3 RPG chargers, 2 locally made hand grenades.
Others are: 120 rounds of 7.62mm NATO, 364 rounds of 7.62mm special ammo, 54 live cartridges, 11 rounds of empty cases of 7.62mm special ammo, 32 magazines, 34 vehicles, 64 mobile phones, 47 motorcycles and sum of N1,582,690.00 amongst other items.
However, troops in the Niger Delta area destroyed 7 dugout pits, 25 boats, 47 storage tanks, 5 vehicles, 141 cooking ovens, one pumping machine, one outboard engine, one tricycle, one speedboat, one tugboat and 51 illegal refining sites. Troops recovered 267,700 litres of stolen crude oil, 567,700 litres of illegally refined AGO and 5,000 litres of DPK.
