WASHINGTON — U.S. and Nigerian forces carried out a joint mission Friday that killed Abu Bakr al-Mainuki, a leader of the Islamic State-affiliated group in West Africa, President Donald Trump said in a late-night social media post.
Trump provided few operational details in his announcement but called al-Mainuki “second in command globally” and said the militant “thought he could hide in Africa, but little did he know we had sources who kept us informed on what he was doing.” An official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said al-Mainuki was a key organizer and financier for the group and had been plotting attacks against U.S. interests.
Nigerian President Bola Tinubu confirmed the operation, saying al-Mainuki and “several of his lieutenants” were killed in a strike on his compound in the Lake Chad Basin. The Nigerian military credited the result to a recently formed U.S.-Nigeria partnership and intelligence sharing, saying the action disrupted a violent terrorist network that threatened Nigeria and the broader West African region.
Al-Mainuki, born in Borno state in 1982, took leadership of the Islamic State’s West Africa affiliate after the 2018 death of the group’s prior regional leader, Mamman Nur, according to the Counter Extremism Project. The monitoring group says al-Mainuki was based in the Sahel and is believed to have fought in Libya when Islamic State elements were active there. He was sanctioned by the U.S. in 2023.
Analysts cautioned that Trump’s characterization of al-Mainuki as “second in command globally” overstates his role. They say he was a deputy to Abu Musab al-Barnawi, the leader of the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) who was reported to have died in 2021. Al-Mainuki is viewed as a central figure in organizing and financing ISWAP after its split from Boko Haram in 2016.
“If confirmed, the killing of Al-Mainuki is huge because this is the first time a security agency has killed someone this high in the ranking of ISWAP,” said Malik Samuel, a senior researcher at Good Governance Africa who studies insurgent groups in Nigeria. He added that the strike likely struck at the heart of ISWAP’s fortified base and could cause disruption within the group.
The operation is the latest in an expanded U.S. role in Nigeria’s fight against violent extremist groups. In December, Trump directed U.S. forces to carry out strikes against Islamic State targets in Nigeria. The U.S. sent troops to advise the Nigerian military in February and deployed drones in March after Trump raised concerns about attacks targeting religious communities in the country.
Friday’s mission also follows a string of covert operations abroad that Trump has announced this year, including the January raid that captured Venezuela’s then-leader Nicolás Maduro and later strikes that sparked the war with Iran. Officials have offered limited public detail about many of those actions.
Nigerian and U.S. officials did not immediately release further operational specifics or confirm whether any U.S. personnel were directly involved in the strike itself. Investigations and intelligence assessments are expected to continue as regional and international agencies verify the results and consider possible repercussions for militant activity across the Sahel and Lake Chad Basin.