Northern Region, Nigeria patches of grass and sand, found in the northeast. In the Sahel region, rain is less than 20 inches (508 mm) per year and the Sahara Desert is encroaching. In the dry north-east corner of the country lies Lake Chad, which Northern Nigeria shares with Niger, Chad and Cameroon. Northern Nigeria is divided into 18 provinces: Kano, the largest of the provinces in terms of population and economy is in the North-Central part of the country. The Kano Native Authority an offshoot of the fula Kano Emirate inherited the ancient trade industries that fuelled the trans saharan trade with North
Boko Haram towards them a higher level of international attention. The U.S. Bureau of Counterterrorism provides the following summary of Boko Haram's 2013 foreign operations: Boko Haram has often managed to evade the Nigerian army by retreating into the hills around the border with Cameroon, whose army is apparently unwilling to confront them. Nigeria, Chad and Niger had formed a Multinational Joint Task Force in 1998. In February 2012, Cameroon signed an agreement with Nigeria to establish a Joint Trans-Border Security Committee, which was inaugurated in November 2013, when Cameroon announced plans to conduct "coordinated but separate" border patrols in 2014. It