Adamu Usman of Pantami quarters in Gombe metropolis yesterday accused military personnel on operations against terrorists of killing his brother and friend.

Usman told newsmen in Gombe yesterday that soldiers at 2am last Friday went to their house in Pantami quarters and forced themselves in without permission, saying that after searching and vandalizing the house they could not find any incriminating item or exhibit. The soldiers, he said, left with his younger brother Hamza Usman, a teacher in a private Nursery/Primary School in Federal Low-cost Area and his friend Adamu Babayo, a roadside auto-mechanic and never heard from them again only to hear that his brother and his friend had died in the soldiers’ hands.

“My brother and his friend were not known to be members of Boko Haram,” he said.

He said all efforts to recover the dead bodies from the army proved abortive as they only received the corpses from the police in the evening on Monday after they were told by the DPO in charge of Gombe Division that the bodies were found on Yola road. But Commander of the 301 Artillery Regiment, Gombe Colonel Joseph Iwara denied his men’s complicity in the crime. The commander told newsmen in Gombe yesterday that the army does not go into any operation without having detailed information about any area or suspect. He said considering the wave of insecurity in the country, especially in the Northeast region, soldiers are only forced to kill when they are attacked as they don’t just kill indiscriminately during their operations and asked journalists to discard such allegations.