At least 128 people have died in a five-hour gun battle between troops and members of the outlawed Boko Haram in Damaturu, the Yobe State capital.
According to a report by Associated Press (AP), military and hospital sources claimed that at least 95 militants, 23 soldiers and eight police officers were killed during the encounter.
Details still trickling in days after the Thursday and Friday attack on Damaturu raise doubts about military claims that it has the upper hand in the fight to halt an Islamic uprising in the North-east, nearly six months after the government imposed a state of emergency on Adamawa, Yobe and Borno States.
Reporters saw that the extremists had set ablaze four police command posts and an army barracks where they looted vehicles and weapons.
Police and witnesses said at least two civilians died — a man believed killed by the insurgents and a civil servant shot by soldiers for breaking the curfew.
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