Insurgents Seize More Girls In Borno …Group Urges All to Intervene

Boko Haram militants killed 32 people and kidnapped scores of others in an attack on the village of Gumsuri in the restive northeast, two local officials and a witness said yesterday.
The officials, who requested anonymity, said locals were still counting those abducted in the attack Sunday in the remote area but that the figure could pass 100 and included women and children.
“After killing our youths, the insurgents have taken away our wives and daughters,” said Mukhtar Buba, who fled Gumsuri to the Borno state capital Maiduguri.
Details took four days to emerge because the mobile phone network has largely collapsed in the area roughly 70 kilometres (43 miles) south of Maiduguri, and many of the roads are impassable.
Gamsuri is located on the road that leads to Chibok, where Boko Haram abducted more than 200 girls from a school in April.
One of the local officials said the village had previously been protected against Boko Haram violence by a strong vigilante force, but that they were overpowered in Sunday’s attack.
“For the past one year, the insurgents have made several attempts to attack Gumsuri but were resisted by the gallant youths of the village, he told our source.
Meanwhile, the Nigerian Army, yesterday, disclosed that it was introducing a new dimension in its counter-terror operations with a view to having a grip on the full spectrum of the operating exercise.
The new dimension in the war on terrorism focuses the psychological domain of operation, which has been noted as one of the areas utilized by terrorists.
Declaring open a seminar on Nigerian Army Psychological Operation Narratives, organised by the 81 Division of the Nigerian Army, General Officer Commanding the division, Major General Dibi, said:
“We have so far focused on the physical domain and have realised primarily physical effects on the Boko Haram terrorists while psychological effects in the cognitive domain remains underutilized. Thus, our counter terrorist operations are not yet across the full spectrum of the operating space.“
Although the operating environment may be imprecisely defined, we need to seek to establish and maintain superiority and constrain the influence and freedom of Boko Haram terrorists across the entire spectrum of the operating space. “Boko Haram terrorists are particularly agile in the physical and psychological domain. This demands our immediate attention as commanders.”
He explained that military psychological operations offered a potentially unique and powerful asset in military operations, both at peace time and in war.
Psychological operations, he stated, take place through the tactical, operational and strategic environments and had also proven to be effective in combat.

Dr. Dawari George (3rd left) briefing Dr. Peterside (2nd right) at the mausoleum of Cardinal Rex Jim Lawson, while Hon. Ojukaye Flag-Amachree, (1st right) listens