At least seven Chadian soldiers have been killed when their vehicle hit a landmine in a lawless region where jihadist groups including Nigeria’s Boko Haram and an Islamic State offshoot are in force.
President Mahamat Idriss Deby Itno said many other soldiers sustained varying degrees of injuries in Monday’s blast in Tchoukou Telia in the restive Lake Chad region, about 200 kilometres (125 miles) from the capital N’Djamena.
“Their vehicle struck a mine while they were patrolling,” he said. “Seven soldiers were killed and several others injured”.
Deby Itno took power after his father Idriss Deby Itno, who ruled Chad with an iron fist for more than three decades, passed on in 2021 while fighting rebels.
He is a candidate in the May 6 presidential poll and faces no real rival as authorities this weekend barred 10 candidates, including two fierce opponents of the military regime, from standing.
Recall that the Chadian troops regularly kill or capture jihadists in the Lake Chad region but also suffer losses though this has considerably decreased over the past year.
Lake Chad, endowed with vast expanse of water and marshland, straddles the borders of Nigeria, Niger, Cameroon and Chad. It has been the site of incessant attacks from fighters from Boko Haram as well as Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP),
