Country Report on Terrorism 2024 - Chapter 1 - Nigeria

Country Overview:  ISIS-WA, BH, and Ansaru continued attacking Nigerian government and security forces and civilians, including Christians, across northern and central regions.  Reports indicated JNIM also began infiltrating areas along the Benin border.  In the northwest, a group called “Lakurawa,” possibly associated with ISIS-GS, gained prominence after attacking civilian targets.  Like BH, Lakurawa did not discriminate between civilians and government officials, whereas ISIS-WA concentrated attacks on government and security forces and continued implementing its own governance structures.  BH and ISIS-WA continued fighting each other; BH factions were largely relegated to rural enclaves, while ISIS-WA maintained its geographic presence in the northeast and remained Nigeria’s most active and capable terrorist group.  Terrorists exploited the military’s absence outside “super camps” by abducting civilians, imposing taxes on farmers, and controlling security along major roads.  Suspected ISIS-WA forces used armed drones for the first time when they attacked a forward operating base in Borno.  For the first time in four years, BH suicide bombers killed and injured dozens.  The difficult security environment exacerbated conditions for civilians and severely constrained relief operations in northeast Nigeria.

BH and ISIS-WA terrorism contributed to the internal displacement of an estimated two million people in Adamawa, Borno, and Yobe States and the external displacement of more than 400,000 Nigerian refugees to neighboring countries, principally Cameroon, Chad, and Niger. The Borno State governor continued efforts to close all internally displaced persons camps in Borno and return refugees to their ancestral homes.  Radical Islamists and Fulani ethnic militias conducted attacks in the Northwest and North Central regions, as did nonstate armed groups known as “bandits.”  Nonstate armed group attacks reportedly caused more civilian deaths in Nigeria in 2024 than all other violence and resulted in thousands of kidnappings, often in large groups.  The Indigenous People of Biafra’s militant wing, the Eastern Security Network, conducted violent attacks in the Southeast.  Since 2023, the Biafra Republic Government in Exile claimed multiple attacks against Nigerian security services and enforced “stay at home” orders that resulted in disappearances, injuries, or deaths of many accused of disobeying.  On November 29, it declared an independent “United States of Biafra” covering much of Nigeria’s Southeast.

The Nigerian government secured 362 terrorism convictions, a milestone in its 15-year fight against terrorism.  Nigeria cooperated with Mission Nigeria on investigations, prosecutions, and prevention of terrorism targeting U.S. interests in Nigeria and beyond.  Nigeria remained on the FATF gray list in 2024 but made high-level political commitments to improve its AML/CFT regime, including improving risk-based supervision of financial institutions and designated nonfinancial businesses and professions, and demonstrating sustained increases in money laundering and terrorist financing investigations and prosecutions.

2024 Terrorism Trends:  Nigeria reported 408 terrorism incidents with 1,950 fatalities in 2024.  ISIS-WA and BH carried out hundreds of attacks targeting military and civilians using small arms, captured military equipment, IEDs, suicide bombings, ambushes, and hostage-takings.  Both criminal gangs and Islamist terrorist groups increasingly targeted Christian communities.

Associated documents