KANO, Nigeria: Boko Haram jihadists killed four people during a raid on a camp for civilians displaced by the Islamist group’s violent insurgency in Nigeria’s troubled northeast, security sources said Saturday.
The gunmen entered the camp in the town of Banki near the border with Cameroon on bicycles and on foot Friday night and opened fire.
“Boko Haram terrorists entered Banki IDP (internally displaced people) camp last night and killed four people, injured four others and took supplies away with them,” a military officer in the town told AFP.
The shots drew the attention of soldiers and policemen outside the camp, who then engaged the militants in an hour-long gunbattle, said the officer, who asked not to be named.
“Two terrorists were killed in the fight and the rest fled,” he added.
A member of a militia force assisting the military said the jihadists used ladders to scale a ditch dug around the camp to stop such an incursion.
“This was why security personnel keeping sentry at the entrance of the camp were taken off-guard,” he said.
“From all indications, they came to steal food supplies.”
Hours later two soldiers were wounded when their patrol vehicle hit a land mine planted by the fleeing jihadists at Freetown village, nine kilometers (five miles) away, he added.
Banki, which is 130 kilometers southeast of Borno state capital Maiduguri, houses 45,000 displaced people in a sprawling camp.
The camp was relatively calm after opening in March 2015.
However Boko Haram has since raided it numerous times, including in February when militants stole food and clothing before being repelled by soldiers.
Eleven people were killed in another raid in September.
Boko Haram’s nine-year armed violence to establish a hard-line Daesh in remote northeastern Nigeria has killed more than 20,000 people.
Boko Haram kills four in Nigeria displaced civilians camp
Boko Haram kills four in Nigeria displaced civilians camp
- Boko Haram’s nine-year armed violence to establish a hard-line Daesh in remote northeastern Nigeria has killed more than 20,000 people
- A member of a militia force assisting the military said the jihadists used ladders to scale a ditch dug around the camp to stop such an incursion
India plans AI ‘data city’ on staggering scale
- ‘The data city is going to come in one ecosystem ... with a 100 kilometer radius’
NEW DELHI: As India races to narrow the artificial intelligence gap with the United States and China, it is planning a vast new “data city” to power digital growth on a staggering scale, the man spearheading the project says.
“The AI revolution is here, no second thoughts about it,” said Nara Lokesh, information technology minister for Andhra Pradesh state, which is positioning the city of Visakhapatnam as a cornerstone of India’s AI push.
“And as a nation ... we have taken a stand that we’ve got to embrace it,” he said ahead of an international AI summit next week in New Delhi.
Lokesh boasts the state has secured investment agreements of $175 billion involving 760 projects, including a $15 billion investment by Google for its largest AI infrastructure hub outside the United States.
And a joint venture between India’s Reliance Industries, Canada’s Brookfield and US firm Digital Realty is investing $11 billion to develop an AI data center in the same city.
Visakhapatnam — home to around two million people and popularly known as “Vizag” — is better known for its cricket ground that hosts international matches than cutting-edge technology.
But the southeastern port city is now being pitched as a landing point for submarine internet cables linking India to Singapore.
“The data city is going to come in one ecosystem ... with a 100 kilometer radius,” Lokesh said. For comparison, Taiwan is roughly 100 kilometers wide.
Lokesh said the plan goes far beyond data connectivity, adding that his state had “received close to 25 percent of all foreign direct investments” to India in 2025.
“It’s not just about the data centers,” he explained while outlining a sweeping vision of change, with Andhra Pradesh offering land at one US cent per acre for major investors.
