Nigeria’s President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, shown here in 2023, has thanked the United States for its work helping Nigeria with an operation to kill Abu-Bilal al-Minuki, a top ISIS leader, Friday night. File Photo by Akintunde Akinleye/EPA
May 16 (UPI) — U.S. and Nigerian forces killed Abu-Bilal al-Minuki, who is alleged to be a second-in-command for ISIS, President Donald Trump announced.
The president said Abu-Bilal al-Minuki was killed Friday night. The Nigerian president’s office said the operation took place at al-Minuki’s compound on Lake Chad Basin, which is in northeast Nigeria.
“Brave American forces and the Armed Forces of Nigeria flawlessly executed a meticulously planned and very complex mission to eliminate the most active terrorist in the world from the battlefield,” Trump said on Truth Social.
“Abu-Bilal al-Minuki, second in command of ISIS globally, thought he could hide in Africa, but little did he know we had sources who kept us informed on what he was doing. He will no longer terrorize the people of Africa, or help plan operations to target Americans,” Trump said. “With his removal, ISIS’s global operation is greatly diminished. Thank you to the Government of Nigeria for your partnership on this operation.”
The Nigerian defense department said it was a “meticulously planned and highly coordinated counterterrorism operation,” CBS News reported.
Al-Minuki was born in 1982 in the Nigerian state of Borno, which borders Cameroon, Chad and Niger.
The State Department described him in 2023 as a leader of the Islamic State in the Sahel region of Africa. At the time, he was a senior official in one of the Islamic State’s General Directorate of Provinces offices, which “provide operational guidance and funding around the world,” the State Department said.
In the same year, he was put on the Treasury Department’s global terrorist list by the Office of Foreign Assets Control.
Nigerian President Bola Ahmed Tinubu thanked Trump in a statement on X.
“Nigeria appreciates this partnership with the United States in advancing our shared security objectives. I extend my sincere gratitude to President Trump for his leadership and unwavering support in this effort.”
“I look forward to more decisive strikes against all terrorist enclaves across the nation,” Tinubu said.
According to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s post on X, U.S. forces had worked for months to hunt “this top ISIS leader in Nigeria who was killing Christians, and we killed him — and his entire posse.”
“Operations like last night’s demonstrate the exceptional lethality, patience and skill of U.S. forces, amplified alongside willing and capable partners, to address shared threats. This should serve as a reminder that we will hunt down those who wish to harm Americans or innocent Christians, wherever they are,” Hegseth said.
Though Trump has blamed Nigeria for not doing enough to protect Christians, Nigeria has noted that it’s more complicated than that. Killings and kidnappings have targeted Christians and Muslims, the two main religious groups in Nigeria.
On Dec. 25, U.S. forces carried out several strikes on alleged terrorists in northwest Nigeria.
Auwal Musa Rafsanjani, director of Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre, said at the time that talk of ISIS targeting people based on religion could create more religious tensions in Nigeria.
“Muslims are being killed and harassed every day by the same criminals,” Rafsanjani said. “This conversation should be about human life, not religion or geography.”
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