Boko Haram jailbreak foiled

A Niger Republic official has said that members of Nigeria’s Islamic extremist group Boko Haram tried to escape from the central prison in Niamey on Saturday afternoon and killed two guards.

Niger prosecutor Ibrahim Waziri said late Saturday night that three prisoners from the radical Islamic group managed to grab a gun and killed two prison guards and injured three others in their attempt to break out of the prison. He said the three prisoners were captured.

The men opened fire on the facility in the centre of the city at around 3pm at the weekend.

“There are two versions of what happened, and right now we think it’s more likely that they came from inside  the jail,” said Niger government spokesman Marou Amadou.

“These are people who are wanted for terrorism.

We do not know how they were able to arm themselves inside the prison, and how they were able to get out to attack the guards. We have two dead guards already and one seriously wounded,” he added.

Ila Yaye, who lives near the prison, said: “We were sitting there when we saw these armed men start to shoot at the guards from the civilian prison.

I saw several of them fall and not get back up.” Local residents fled as police blocked off roads leading to the prison, allowing only ambulances into the area.

The attempted prison break attack came less than a week Niger Republic was rocked by a double suicide bombing by Islamic radicals in the towns of Agadez and Arlit in which 35 were killed, including the attackers.

----The Sun