Separatist gunmen kill five soldiers in Nigeria’s southeast, army says

Armed men killed at least five soldiers in a surprise attack in Nigeria’s southeastern Abia state, the military said on Friday, the latest in a string of raids in a region rife with separatist violence.
No group claimed responsibility, but the army blamed the outlawed separatist Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) movement which wants the surrounding region to secede from Nigeria.
The gunmen attacked a military checkpoint at Obikabia junction in Obingwa local government area on Thursday, defence spokesperson Major-General Edward Buba said in a statement.
He added, “The military will be fierce in its response. We will bring overwhelming military pressure on the group to ensure their total defeat.”
The unrest in the southeast has piled pressure on a government and military already struggling to contain attacks and kidnappings in the northwest, a 15-year Islamist insurgency in the northeast and sectarian and herder-farmer clashes in central regions.
IPOB campaigns for the secession of southeastern Nigeria where the majority belong to the Igbo group.