Nigerian Boko Haram fighters went on the rampage in the Cameroonian border town of Fotokol Wednesday, massacring dozens of civilians and torching a mosque before being repelled by regional forces.
More than 500 bodies counted so far after Boko Haram massacre in Fotokol. And the counting goes on, a military source told ChiefBisong Etahoben, an international investigative journalist and traditional ruler in Cameroon.
The onslaught came a day after Chad sent troops across the border to flush the jihadists out of the Nigerian town of Gamboru, which lies some 500 metres (yards) from Fotokol on the other side of a bridge.
Chad’s army said it had killed more than 200 Boko Haram militants in the intervention — the first by regional forces against Boko Haram on its home ground. But some of the insurgents escaped, it added.
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“Boko Haram inflicted so much damage here this morning. They have killed dozens of people,” Umar Babakalli, a resident of Fotokol, told AFP by telephone.
Several residents said civilians’ throats were slit and that the town’s main mosque was torched.
After several hours of clashes Cameroonian troops, backed by Chadian forces who scrambled back from Nigeria to help guard the town, managed to repel the assault.
No official death toll was immediately available.