France, Jan. 26 -- Lieutenant General John Brennan of US Africa Command said the US was intensifying its partnership with Nigeria and maintaining limited engagement on security with junta-led governments in Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger, as part of a broader push to work more closely with African militaries.

"We've gotten a lot more aggressive and are working with partners to target, kinetically, the threats, mainly ISIS [Islamic State]," Brennan told France's AFP during an interview on the sidelines of an inaugural US-Nigeria security meeting in Abuja last Thursday.

The first US-Nigeria Joint Working Group meeting took place about a month after the US announced surprise Christmas Day strikes on Islamic State-linked targets in northwest ...