Thursday, January 15, 2015

UPDATE: Nigeria, ISIS, and AQAP

Ugh, Nigeria continues to be a hot mess thanks to Boko Haram and that group's apparent desire to be blood thirsty assholes, although I'm quite convinced the government of Nigeria has its share of the blame for the chaos.

On Saturday a suicide bomber struck a market killing 16 and wounding more than 20. The bomber? A 10 year old girl. The explosives were likely detonated remotely. It would not surprise me at all if this girl was one of the 300 or so school girls kidnapped by Boko Haram last April.

Boko Haram is also continuing offensive operations and recently attacked the town of Baga near the border with Chad. Amnesty International claims 2000 people were killed in that attack. However, the Nigerian government states the death toll was more like 150. I don't know who to believe on this one. Amnesty International is likely getting their reports second hand, which may be exaggerated by locals, but Nigerian authorities are probably trying to downplay the death toll to prevent the government from looking incompetent and keep panic from spreading. Like I said, a hot mess.

Moving on to Islamic State news...because they are such fun group of lovable scamps. Oh look, the Da'ish-bags are using children to conduct their executions. The Islamic State really is doing every thing they can to get as many people as possible to hate them. I've been appalled by AQI/ISI/ISIS tactics since 2005 so nothing they do really comes as a shock to me anymore.

Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula has claimed responsibility for the Paris attack. I wonder what took them so long. I also wonder if France is going to get involved with the civil war in Yemen in order to defeat AQAP. The government of Yemen along with their Houthi puppet masters probably wouldn't allow that, but if France is angry enough that may not matter.

UPDATE: Amnesty International has issued (provided may be a better term?) satellite imagery of the area. Their death toll numbers are likely more correct than government of Nigeria's numbers.

So much ugly news. Here's a puppy to cheer everyone up:

He probably poops on the carpet though...

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