Four jihadists escaped Sunday evening from a prison in the capital Nouakchott during an escape that claimed the lives of two members of the police, the Mauritanian Interior Ministry announced on Monday.
“At 9:00 p.m. on March 5, 2023, four terrorists managed to escape from Nouakchott central prison following assaulting the guards, which led to an exchange of fire during which two members of the National Guard” died and two others were slightly injured, the ministry said in a statement.
Mauritanian authorities have not revealed the identity of the fugitives. But according to the information, two of them had received a death sentence, while the other two are awaiting trial for belonging to a terrorist organization. Their vehicle had been found in the northeast of Nouakchott.
According to Mauritanian media, among the escaped jihadists is Salek Ould Cheikh, a Mauritanian, sentenced to death in 2011 and escaped from Nouakchott on December 31, 2016. The man was later arrested in Guinea following crossing the border from Guinea-Bissau. He had also entered Senegal following his flight.
