US to deploy 200 troops to Nigeria for anti-jihad training mission

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States is planning to send about 200 troops to Nigeria to train the country’s military to fight militants, weeks after President Donald Trump ordered airstrikes against what he called Islamic State targets.

The move would add to a small US team already in the West African nation after the first publicly acknowledged US ground presence there since carrying out strikes on Christmas Day.

The troops are expected to deploy in the coming weeks to provide training and technical support, a US official told Reuters on Tuesday. The official said the 200 troops will supplement a handful of US military personnel already in Nigeria to help local forces.

They will be assigned to locations across the country to provide training and technical expertise but will not be involved in combat operations, the official said.

The US military said last week it had sent a small team of troops to Nigeria without specifying a number, marking the first acknowledgment of US forces on the ground since Washington struck by air on 25 December.

Trump has said there could be more US military action in Nigeria, while Reuters has reported that the United States had been conducting surveillance flights over the country from Ghana since at least late November.

'CHRISTIAN GENOCIDE'

Relations between Nigeria and the United States shifted after Trump late last year threatened to enter Nigeria “guns-a-blazing” to avenge what he has called a “Christian genocide”.

Weeks later, on Christmas Day, US Navy warships aided by Nigerian intelligence launched 16 Tomahawk missiles at what Trump said was the “terrorist scum” responsible for killing Nigerian Christians.

US military officials are still assessing the damage from the strikes in northwest Nigeria but said more than three dozen Islamic State-affiliated fighters were flushed out and later arrested by Nigerian authorities.

Residents have said the missiles hit empty fields and vacant militant hide-outs.

Nigeria has come under intense pressure from Washington to act after Trump alleged the country was failing to protect Christians from Islamist militants operating in the northwest.

The Nigerian government denies any systematic persecution of Christians, saying it is targeting Islamist fighters and other armed groups that attack and kill both Christians and Muslims.

US Africa Command, the US military command responsible for operations in Africa, said it was helping Nigeria in its campaign against several extremist groups, including Boko Haram and Islamic State’s West Africa Province.