The Muhajirun group has launched a series of attacks in the past weeks on police stations in the northern state of Yobe and along Nigeria's northern border with Niger, killing at least two officers.

Army spokesman Chukwuemeka Onwuamaegbu said Yobe's governor, Bukar Abba Ibrahim, had appealed to President Olusegun Obasanjo to send in troops "to assist the police to curb the violent activities of the bandits."

"Soldiers were sent in last week and they have been able to dislodge the bandits. The place is now peaceful," he added.

Onwuamaegbu could not confirm a report that members of the group had fled to neighbouring Niger.

"I know they have been flushed out of Yobe State. I don't know where they have run to. Our soldiers are still on the ground to ensure that they don't operate from there anymore," he said.

Muhajirun gunmen stormed into the state capital, Damaturu, on Thursday last week, and sacked three police stations.

The sect is thought to be around 200-strong and made up principally of middle-class Nigerian graduates inspired by the Taliban's vision of a Islamic state.

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