TheCable

At least 143 members of the Boko Haram sect were killed in an attack on a military camp in Cameroon on Monday, Issa Tchiroma Bakary, the country’s minister of communications, has said. 

According to Bakary, who said the fighting occurred near the northern town of Kolofata, this was the heaviest loss sustained by the group on Cameroonian soil.

“The terrorists … lost 143 lives and important warfare equipment made up of assault rifles of various brands, heavy weapons and bullets of all calibers,” he told Reuters.

“On the Cameroon side, we lost one life, the Corporal-Chef Bela Onana, as well as four wounded.”

Although no independent verification of the casualty toll was available, a senior Cameroonian official said last month that the army determines death tolls either visually, or by counting the number of vehicles destroyed and estimating how many militants each vehicle carried.

In January, leader of the sect Abubakar Shekau threatened to kill Paul Biya, president of the country.

On Monday, the militants “struck with heavy gunfire” at a military base in the norther part of the country, forcing residents to flee the city.