Updates: Nigeria confirms US strikes on ISIL targets in its northwest

If you would like to read our explainer on the US strikes on Nigeria, please go here.

Alternatively, our explainer on the armed group known as Lakurawa can be read here.

This live page will be closing soon. Here’s a look at the key events.

• The United States, in cooperation with Nigeria, conducted air attacks against fighters in northwest Nigeria.
• US President Donald Trump tells Politico that the strikes he ordered on Nigerian fighters “decimated” their camps.
• Nigerian Foreign Minister Yusuf Tuggar says Abuja provided the US with intelligence ahead of the Christmas Day strike.
• A US defence official tells Reuters that the strike was carried out by about a dozen Tomahawk missiles and that another attack is not imminent.
• Isa Salihu, the chairman of the Tangaza local government in Sokoto State, told Nigeria’s Premium Times newspaper that one of the areas hit by the strike was a “primary route” for fighters.

Neither Abuja nor Washington have identified their precise targets among the multiple armed groups operating in Nigeria.

An analyst questioned the choice of striking northwestern Sokoto State, where non-ideological armed gangs known as “bandits” are a bigger concern than fighters – who may not even have been hit by the strikes.

“If you’re going to strike, then it should not be the least” affected areas, said Victoria Ekhomu, an analyst and head of the Association of Industrial Security and Safety Operators of Nigeria.

She told the AFP news agency that a more obvious target would have been northeastern Borno State, the epicentre of Nigeria’s armed conflict.

The main theatre of the country’s years-long fighting is in fact the northeast of Nigeria.

Nigeria has been battling hardline fighters in its northeast since 2009, including Boko Haram and a rival offshoot, the ISIL (ISIS) affiliate in West Africa Province.

Several other groups, some of them associated with the northeastern fighters, have established themselves in the northwest.

Some researchers have recently linked an armed group known as Lakurawa, the leading armed group located in Sokoto State, to the ISIL affiliate in Sahel Province, which is active primarily in neighbouring Niger and Mali, although other researchers are doubtful.

Research on Lakurawa is complicated because the term has been used to describe various fighters in the northwest.

Fears are also growing that another powerful Sahel armed group, the al-Qaeda-affiliated Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims, might establish itself in Nigeria after an attack claimed by its fighters on the Nigeria-Benin border in October.

Read our report on Lakurawa here.

Sanusi Madabo, a 40-year-old farmer in the Nigerian village of Jabo in the state of Sokoto, was preparing for bed on Thursday night when he heard a loud noise that sounded like a plane crashing.

He rushed outside his mud house with his wife to see the sky glowing a bright red.

The light burned bright for hours, Madabo told The Associated Press news agency: “It was almost like daytime.”

He did not learn until later that he had witnessed a US attack on an alleged ISIL (ISIS) camp.

Residents said the village had never been attacked by armed groups as part of the violence the US says is widespread although such attacks regularly occur in neighbouring villages.

“As it approached our area, the heat became intense,” recalled Abubakar Sani, who lives just a few houses from the scene of the explosion.

“Our rooms began to shake, and then fire broke out,” he told the AP. “The Nigerian government should take appropriate measures to protect us as citizens. We have never experienced anything like this before.”

Cameron Hudson, a former US official who worked on Africa-related issues, says the US strike is unlikely to have a big impact in the near term.

“It’s not realistic to think that a few cruise missiles are going to change much in the short term,” Hudson told Reuters.

“The Trump administration will have to demonstrate its own long-term commitment to ending this militancy if it hopes to have any effect.”

The defence official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, tells the Reuters news agency that the strike was carried out by about a dozen Tomahawk missiles launched from a US Navy warship.

The official said another strike did not appear imminent but did not rule out future operations.

This specific strike was carried out, the official told the agency, in part because the location was too remote for Nigerian forces to reach it.

“It’s partially symbolic,” the official said, adding that the aim was also deterrence and to send a message that the Trump administration was prepared to use the military.

Al Jazeera’s Ahmed Idris reports from Abuja:

Let’s bring you up to speed.

• The US carried out an air strike against ISIL (ISIS) fighters in northwest Nigeria, in coordination with the Nigerian government, surprising locals.
• Isa Salihu, the chairman of the Tangaza local government in Sokoto State, told Nigeria’s Premium Times newspaper that one of the areas hit by the strike was a “primary route” for fighters and likely to have been hit by them.
• Former commissioner for information and culture, Jonathan Vatsa, welcomed the US strike, calling it a “relief”, The Sun, a local news agency, reports.
• The director of the nonprofit Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre (CISLAC)  dismissed US President Donald Trump’s framing that a strike was necessary to prevent a “slaughter” of Christians in Nigeria.

Al Jazeera’s Ahmed Idris reports from Lagos:

In the Nigerian village of Jabo, Abubakar Sani, who lives a few houses from the scene of the explosion due to the US strikes, said the heat from the strike became “intense”.

“Our rooms began to shake, and then fire broke out,” he told The Associated Press news agency.

“The Nigerian government should take appropriate measures to protect us as citizens. We have never experienced anything like this before,” Sani added.

For Balira Sa’idu, 17, the strikes worried her as she prepares to get married.

“I am supposed to be thinking about my wedding, but right now I am panicking,” Sa’idu told the AP.

“The strike has changed everything. My family is afraid, and I don’t even know if it is safe to continue with the wedding plan in Jabo,” she added.

Watch the comments by analyst Ebenezer Obadare below:

Isa Salihu, the chairman of the Tangaza local government in Sokoto State, has told Nigeria’s Premium Times newspaper that one of the areas hit by a US strike in the state was a “primary route” for fighters and is most likely to have hit them.

The areas struck are believed to be hideouts of fighters along the Nigeria-Niger border in Sokoto, the official was quoted as saying.

Salihu stressed that casualty figures have not been confirmed pending a formal security briefing, according to the newspaper.

“That area serves as their primary route when entering from the Niger Republic,” Salihu reportedly said.

“They frequent these zones and have established camps in the dense forests near the border.”