Nigerian security forces managed to free an army officer kidnapped in August from Defence military academy in northwest Nigeria, the military said in a statement on Friday evening.
An armed gang attacked the Nigerian Defense Academy (NDA), the country’s elite training school, in Kaduna on August 24, assassinated two officers, and kidnapped a third.
On Friday, the army launched a raid on a gang’s hideout where the kidnapped officer was in detention in the Afaka region, the statement said.
The same source said that the bandits engaged in an exchange of fire with the troops, adding that “during this exchange, the soldiers were able to save the officer”, who was “slightly injured”.
For months, Northwest and central Nigeria have faced criminal gangs, which loot villages, kidnap and kill residents.
The Nigerian military claimed that several bandit camps were destroyed and that “dozens of bandits” were killed during the operation.
