Five suspected members of the Boko Haram Takfiri terrorist group and three civilians have been killed after the terrorists detonated their explosive vests in Nigeria’s northeastern province of Borno, police say. According to deputy superintendent Victor Isuku, two separate attacks, one by a female duo and the other by three men, were conducted in the eastern outskirts of the provincial capital Maiduguri, some 10 kilometers apart from each other, late on Sunday.

He added that the three male assailants, wearing explosive-laden vests, approached a military checkpoint while firing assault rifles. One of them detonated his explosives, killing all three plus a pro-government anti-terror fighter. Some two hours later, two female bombers set off their explosives, killing themselves and two unidentified people passing close by them.  Nobody has so far claimed responsibility for the deadly attacks but they bear the hallmarks of the ultra-violent group.

In recent months, army troops and civilian fighters in Nigeria have managed to foil many bomb attacks involving terrorists wearing explosive vests before the assailants were able to reach heavily-populated targets and detonate their bombs of their own accord. Last month, however, two women, with Boko Haram, killed 57 people and injured 177, including 120 children, after they detonated their explosive vests at a bustling market at Madagali, the capital city of the neighboring province of Adamawa.

At dusk on Saturday, a group of Boko Haram terrorists launched an attack on a military base in the town of Buni Yadi, in the northeastern province of Yobe, leading to an “intense battle”, which killed at least five soldiers, including a newly-deployed captain. The attack, however, was “repelled” by army troops, said Lieutenant George Okupe, a spokesman for the Buni Yadi base.

The town, situated some 65 kilometers from the provincial capital Damaturu, fell into the hands of the terror group in February 2014 after terrorists launched a deadly night assault on a boys’ boarding school, torching the building while students were asleep. At least 43 students lost their lives in the arson attack. The government troops, however, regained the control of the town in a bloody battle in March last year, after Boko Haram terrorists had sacked the town.

Presstv