The United States has offered a $5 million reward for providing “information” about a 2017 terrorist attack in Tongo-Tongo, in western Niger, that killed four American soldiers, according to their embassy in Niamey.
On October 4, 2017, nine military personnel – four Americans and five Nigerians – were killed in an ambush by terrorists near Tongo-Tongo, about 20 kilometers from the border with Mali.
The Islamic State in the Greater Sahara claimed responsibility for the attack.
A statement from the US embassy in Niamey, released on the fifth anniversary of the attack, said a $5 million reward would be provided in exchange for “obtaining information leading to the prosecution of those responsible for the Tongo-Tongo ambush.”
Posters will be posted in Niamey and the Tillabéri (West) area where the ambush took place. One of the posters depicts eight Islamic State members in the Greater Sahara, including an image of the organization’s late leader, Adnan Abu Walid al-Sahrawi, crossed out in red, with the caption “Enemy killed in the field.”
In September 2021, Paris announced the massacre of the Sahrawis in “mid-August” of the same year in an attack on French troops in Mali.
A US embassy source told AFP that “three terrorists involved in the Tongo-Tongo attack have been arrested and prosecuted,” without specifying their identities or where they were tried.
Niamey and Washington have previously spoken of “collusion” by local residents with “terrorists” who arrived aboard about ten cars and twenty motorcycles in Tongo-Tongo, about 100 kilometers from Niamey, according to the Nigerian army.
A Nigerian security source said the head of Tongo-Tongo village was arrested after the attack “on charges of conspiring” with the attackers.
