Nigerian troops nab 1,240 Boko Haram suspects in Sambisa forest

At least 1,240 suspected Boko Haram terrorists were arrested during a mop-up operation by troops inside the Sambisa forest, the Nigeria Army said Wednesday.

Maj. -Gen. Lucky Irabor, the Theater Commander of Operation Lafiya Dole, disclosed this while giving update to newsmen on the military operation in Maiduguri, the restive northeast Borno State capital.

Irabor said 413 of the suspects were adults; 323 were female adults; 251 male children, while 253 were female children.

He said the suspects were apprehended during a mop-up operation against the sect members in the forest.

"We are interrogating them to know whether they are Boko Haram members, because there is no way somebody that is not their member would live inside Sambisa forest," he added.

"We are still on the trail of the terrorists and I want to assure you that all escape routes have been blocked," he said.

"Within this period, also, about 30 fleeing suspected Boko Haram members have surrendered to the Niger Multinational Troops on the shores of the Lake Chad and we learnt that they were taken to Difa in the Niger Republic," the military commander told reporters.

"The suspects include 24 male and six females," he said.

Boko Haram has killed nearly 15,000 people and displaced over 2 million during a seven-year insurgency aimed at creating an Islamic state in Nigeria.

In recent years its attacks have spilled into neighboring Niger, Cameroon and Chad.

Hundreds of Boko Haram fighters surrendered in Chad in October and November as the group ceded territory.

President Muhammadu Buhari on Saturday said Nigeria's army captured its last enclave in the vast Sambisa forest last Friday. Endit