Nigeria Says Taliban Victory Puts Africa in Terror Spotlight

With the Taliban's swift takeover in Afghanistan, Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari this week warned that the "war on terror" is not over but is shifting to Africa. Writing in the Financial Times newspaper, Buhari said Africa needs more than U.S. military assistance to defeat terrorism – it needs investment.

The Nigerian president warned in his opinion piece that the U.S. departure from Afghanistan did not mean the so-called war on terror was winding down. He said said the threat is merely shifting to a new frontline - in Africa.

He cited the rising threat of terrorist groups in Africa, from Boko Haram in Nigeria and the Sahel region to al-Shabab in Somalia and a rising insurgency in Mozambique.

But Buhari lamented that Western allies, “bruised by their Middle East and Afghan experiences,” were not prioritizing Africa.

The president's spokespeople could not be immediately reached for comment.

But expert Kabiru Adamu of Beacon Security agrees with the president's opinion.

"It is very likely that the developments in Afghanistan could definitely spur terrorist groups within Africa. It will embolden them, it will make them look at the bigger picture, which is the fact that resilience and a continuation of their efforts could lead to victory," Adamu said.

But while Buhari praised U.S. airstrikes in July against al-Shabab in Somalia, he emphasized that U.S. military forces on the ground in Africa is not what is needed.

He said what Africa needs most is U.S. investment in infrastructure to help provide jobs and economic opportunities for the rapidly growing population.

The Nigerian president said that Africa’s population has nearly doubled since 2001, the start of the U.S.-led war on terror.
And he conceded that Nigeria’s own home-grown terror group, Boko Haram, was first agitated by lack of opportunities.

Buhari also noted the recent attacks in Mozambique’s Cabo Delgado region are centered around a profitable natural gas project that provided few jobs for locals.

But founder of the Global Sentinel security magazine, Senator Iroegbu, says that Africa’s terrorist groups are not driven by economics alone.

"You know, there's a subtle competition among these jihadist groups to outdo each other. Since Taliban has recorded this success, other like the al-Qaida, ISIS, may try to also show their own hands," Iroegbu said.

In his opinion piece, Buhari wrote if Afghanistan taught us a lesson, it was that although sheer force can blunt terror, removal of that force can cause the threat to return.

Nigeria has been fighting Boko Haram since 2009, with the conflict spilling into neighboring Cameroon, Chad, and Niger.
More than 30,000 people are estimated to have been killed and millions displaced in the conflict.

African nations have been working together more to fight insurgents, from the G-5 Sahel to the Southern African Development Community’s troops sent, for the first time in July, to Mozambique.

But ultimately, wrote Buhari, Africans need not swords but plowshares to defeat terror.

The boots they need on the ground, he said, are those of constructors, not the military. 

By Timothy Obiezu 

VOA

Video - Boko Haram exploiting social vulnerabilities

For over a decade, Boko Haram has launched attacks in the Sahel region. The group launched its first series of attacks in Nigeria's Borno state. A report by the Tony Blair Institute says Boko Haram established power by exploiting social vulnerabilities. Chief among those is the low-level of education in Nigeria's northeast. UNESCO puts the literacy rate for Borno state at 14 point 5 percent. The report urges authorities to prioritise soft-power policy programmes to combat the threat posed by Boko Haram.

Nigerian Women Lead Reintegration of Ex-Boko Haram Militants

The Nigerian government's efforts to reintegrate former Boko Haram militants has seen hundreds of fighters go through rehabilitation. But it also gets pushback from the conflict's victims, who want the militants to be held accountable. At a conference in the capital, women from the conflict-affected areas are getting support to head up reconciliation between the former terrorists and their communities.

Some 45 women from Nigeria's northeastern states of Borno, Adamawa and Yobe file in for a two-day conference in Abuja.

They're here to discuss a sensitive subject - the reconciliation and reintegration of ex-Boko Haram fighters into their communities.

The conference is a joint initiative by the non-profit Center for Humanitarian Dialogue in Switzerland, U.N. Women and the International Organization for Migration (IOM). It’s designed to promote women-led community peacekeeping in the northeast, said Millicent Lewis-Ojumu, director at Center for Humanitarian Dialogue.

"We know and from experience have seen that when the women are involved in the conversations, peace building, in helping to resolve issues relating to how to reintegrate and rehabilitate former combatants or person's associated with Boko Haram, that they are very effective," said Lewis-Ojumu.

Since launching the safe exit program, “Operation Safe Corridor” for repentant fighters in 2016, authorities say the program has met with resistance from host communities.

The scheme was launched as part of a growing awareness for the use of amnesty to persuade terrorists to lay down their guns. Nearly 1,000 ex-fighters have been rehabilitated under the government's program.

But very few are successfully living in communities. Most of them eventually rejoin Boko Haram due to rejection.

Hamzatu Alamin is one of the participants at the conference. She started talking about reconciliation 10 years ago when her community was hit hard and young men were coerced into joining Boko Haram.

But she said her efforts attracted some unwanted attention.

"You can be arrested by state actors and accused of being an accomplice. And secondly, the boys (Boko Haram), if you make a mistake, you can be their target,” she said.

Women like Alamin here said they hope to improve their community's acceptance of former jihadists after the conference.

But attending the conference along with other women also lifts the burden of being negatively labeled with terrorists.

"I have been communicating with them. I am now able to say it freely because I know that even the government is communicating with them. The government and security forces are using many of the boys I communicate with as outlets to get the people they're rehabilitating,” she said.

Maria Quintero, program manager at IOM Nigeria, said women also need socioeconomic stability if the program is to succeed.

"The Nigerian women are very strong. What we have found as well is that they're very influential in the decision of the males. Women have a role to play especially when it comes to males coming back to the communities,” said Quintero.

More than 35,000 people have been killed and millions displaced since the start of the Boko Haram insurgency in 2009. Boko Haram, which opposes Western education, has frequently targeted schools.

By Timothy Obiezu 

VOA

Related story: Nigeria's military investigates reports of Boko Haram leader's death

 

What Abubakar Shekau’s reported death means for Nigeria security

On May 19, Abubakar Shekau, longtime leader of Nigeria’s Boko Haram armed group, was reported dead – again.

While details remain murky, local media reports citing intelligence sources claimed Shekau detonated his suicide vest when rival fighters of the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) tried to capture him in his hideout in Sambisa forest in northeastern Nigeria.

Shekau has been reported killed or seriously wounded several times in recent years, including in official statements released by Nigeria’s military – only to resurface in online videos weeks later to ridicule such declarations. This time, the Nigerian army has said it is investigating the reports and has yet to issue a definitive statement.

Still, the reports have been met with mixed reactions and raised questions about the security implications in the country.

“What a Shekau death means is the Islamic State [ISWAP] is set to come out as the dominant player in the other side of the conflict, which of course means more problems for the Nigerian military,” Confidence MacHarry, geopolitical security analyst at Lagos-based SMB Intelligence, told Aljazeera.

For more than a decade, the Nigerian army has struggled to contain Boko Haram’s violent attacks in northeastern Nigeria, in a worsening conflict that has also spilled over into neighbouring Cameroon, Chad and Niger. More than 30,000 people are estimated to have been killed and some 3 million forced from their homes.

Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari was first elected in 2015 on the back of a promise to tackle insecurity in the northeastern region within two years. In his first year in office, the military, with assistance from regional troops, pushed the fighters back and retook key towns, and Buhari famously declared that Boko Haram has been “technically” defeated.

However, the armed group and its offshoots continued staging attacks, while the military’s campaigns were undermined by a number of factors, including corruption and inadequate equipment as well as funding and workforce shortages.

More recently, the army has lost a string of towns in the northeast and Lake Chad region and drawn sharp criticism over its failure to crush the fighters.

If Shekau has indeed been killed and ISWAP fighters are responsible, some analysts say it will further reduce Nigerians’ confidence in the country’s military to rout the fighters and end the conflict.

“The first implication [of Shekau’s killing at the hands of ISWAP] for national security is a larger interpretation about the capacity of the Nigerian state,” Freedom Onuoha, a counterterrorism expert and senior lecturer at the University of Nigeria, told Al Jazeera.

“It also shows that the people’s lack of confidence in the capacity of the national security forces to rein in criminal actors would decline further,” he said.

“That’s a major loss from a national security point of view.”
 

Who is Abubakar Shekau?

In the 2000s, Shekau was the deputy of Muhammed Yusuf, the founder of Boko Haram. In fiery speeches, Yusuf criticised government corruption and what he believed was the incomplete implementation of Islamic law in northeast Nigeria – Boko Haram translates to “Western education is forbidden”.

During clashes in 2009 between the followers of the religious group and security forces, Yusuf was arrested and shot in police custody. Shekau then took the reins of the ragtag prayer group and led his followers to launch attacks across the northeast region.

From the start, Shekau gained notoriety for his brutality.

He sent children and women on suicide missions, often targeting crowded markets and mosques. His fighters looted, kidnapped and killed civilians without mercy. In 2014, Boko Haram’s abduction of 276 schoolgirls in the northeastern town of Chibok shocked the world and drew widespread condemnation. More than 100 of the schoolgirls are still missing.

In 2015, Shekau – albeit reluctantly – pledged allegiance to ISIL (ISIS) and the group took up the name of ISWAP. But the following year, some of his followers, uncomfortable with his leadership style, splintered from Shekau’s forces.

Led by Abu Musab al-Barnawi, a son of the Boko Haram founder Yusuf, they gained ISIL’s recognition and retained the ISWAP name, while Shekau remained in charge of a faction that reassumed the armed group’s original name, Jama’tu Ahlis Sunna Lidda’awati wal-Jihad, or JAS.

ISWAP, whose main target is the Nigerian military, has grown in influence and power in recent years, with an estimated 3,500-5,000 fighters overshadowing the 1,500-2,000 in the Shekau-led faction, according to the International Crisis Group (ICG).

The two groups have been embroiled in a protracted feud over a number of ideological differences, with hundreds of their members reported dead in previous rounds of fighting.

“It [ISWAP] has notched military successes and made inroads among Muslim civilians by treating them better than its parent organisation and by filling gaps in governance and service delivery,” ICG said in a 2019 report.

“By filling gaps in governance and service delivery, it has cultivated a level of support among local civilians that Boko Haram never enjoyed and has turned neglected communities in the area and islands in Lake Chad into a source of economic support,” it added, noting that the group digs wells, polices cattle rustling and provides a modicum of healthcare in the communities it controls, where “its taxation is generally accepted by civilians”.

If Shekau has been killed this time, some experts said they expect some of his fighters to join forces with ISWAP to form a formidable force against the Nigerian military.

“What we’re going to see is the reabsorption of some of Shekau’s terror network in the northeast inherited by the new ISWAP leadership,” Confidence said. “ISWAP will to some extent inherit Shekau’s fighters because many of them are dependent on financial assistance and a central leadership to survive,” he added.

However, Dickson Osajie, an international security expert, disagreed.

“It won’t be 100 percent defection,” Osajie said. “The fighters who have pledged allegiance to Shekau would want to regroup and take revenge for Shekau’s death, causing more crisis.”

With the fight against armed groups far from over, regardless of whether Shekau is still alive, Onuoha said it is time for the army to change its strategy.

“The military needs to reconfigure as a matter of urgency the overall intelligence gathering-sharing architecture,” he said. “They need to look at strategic communication, working with other agencies to deal with issues like the financing systems of terror groups like ISWAP.”

In the past, security analysts monitoring the insecurity in the northeast have often criticised the military’s defensive approach. And for Osajie, an ex-military, the army must act swiftly to take advantage of the situation surrounding Shekau’s fate.

“In security management, you don’t give the enemy opportunity to plan,” he said. “Sadly, one issue with Nigeria is they are giving the enemy time to plan. Instead, the military should carry out an offensive attack against the remnants of Boko Haram in Sambisa forest because their morale is currently down,” he told Al Jazeera. 

By Festus Iyorah 

Al Jazeera

Related story: Nigeria's military investigates reports of Boko Haram leader's death

Nigeria's military investigates reports of Boko Haram leader's death

Nigeria's military is investigating reports that the leader of militant Islamist group Boko Haram may have been killed or seriously injured following clashes with rival jihadists, an army spokesman said on Friday.

Abubakar Shekau has been the figurehead of an Islamist insurgency that has since 2009 killed more than 30,000 people, forced around 2 million people to flee their homes and spawned one of the world's worst humanitarian crises.

A number of reports published on Thursday in Nigeria media, citing intelligence sources, said Shekau was seriously hurt or killed after his insurgents clashed with members of Islamic State in West Africa Province (ISWAP), which broke away from his group in 2016.

Reuters has been unable to independently verify the claims.

A Nigerian Army spokesman, Mohammed Yerima, said the military were investigating.

"It's a rumour. We are investigating it. We can only say something if we confirm it," said the spokesman.

Shekau was said to have been killed on several occasions over the last 12 years, including in announcements by the military, only to later appear in a video post.

ISWAP was previously part of Shekau's militant Islamist group before its split five years ago, pledging allegiance to Islamic State. The schism was due to religious ideological disagreements over the killing of civilians by Boko Haram, to which ISWAP objected.

Shekau's death, if confirmed, could potentially end of fighting between the two groups, enabling either to absorb the others' fighters and consolidate its hold on northeast Nigerian territory.

Reuters

Related stories: Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau possibly dead

Leader of Boko Haram Abubakar Shekau mocks Nigeria army

Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau apparently alive - releases new video

 

Cameroon Military Says It Pushed Boko Haram Fighters into Nigeria

YAOUNDE, CAMEROON - Cameroon's military said Wednesday its troops pushed back about 80 terrorists from Fotokol, a town on the border with Nigeria.

The statement said the Boko Haram fighters were from the Nigerian town of Wulgo in Borno State.

Cameroon's military said it killed several fighters in clashes this week, but Boko Haram escaped with all but two of the bodies. The military said it destroyed six war jeeps and seized a large arsenal, including machine guns and assault rifles.

The military said Monday's operation was led by troops of the Multinational Joint Task Force of the Lake Chad Basin Commission.

A military spokesperson, Navy Captain Atonfack Guemo Cyrille Serge, said the operation freed several civilians who had been abducted by the militants.

Nineteen-year-old Zumbaisi Babale, who witnessed the abductions, said the fighters took away his elder sister and a man with whom she was seeking refuge in their village church. He said he hid under a bench until the fighters left, then the military took him to their base for protection.

Midjiyawa Bakari, governor of Cameroon's Far North region, said Boko Haram fighters are still lurking near the border, and civilians should report strangers in their towns and villages.

He said via a messaging app from the northern town of Maroua that the military has been mobilized to be alert all along Cameroon's border with Nigeria and Chad. All travelers and their goods will be checked to protect Cameroon's territory from Boko Haram and any rebel group that attempts to penetrate, Bakari added.

Monday's attack came a week after Chad announced the death of its president, Idriss Deby.

Conflict resolution specialist Joseph Vincent Ntouda Ebode of the University of Yaounde said the terrorists may have mobilized thinking that Chad had called back its troops and there were fewer soldiers fighting Boko Haram.

He said the terrorists know that Chad, which contributes a significant number of troops to combat Boko Haram, is now concentrating on stopping its internal security threats. For that reason, he said, Cameroon and Nigeria should remobilize their troops because Boko Haram terrorists will intensify attacks since they are aware that Chad has other priorities.

It is not known if the Transitional Military Council in Chad will be as devoted as Chad's late president in fighting Boko Haram, Ebode added.

There are about 8,000 troops in the multinational joint task force fighting Boko Haram.

The task force has not indicated whether Chad withdrew its troops.

By Moki Edwin Kindzeka

VOA

Aid group facilities targeted in northeast Nigeria

Suspected Islamic extremists attacked the offices of several international aid groups, setting them ablaze and renewing concerns Sunday about the safety of humanitarian workers in Nigeria’s embattled northeast.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the overnight attack in Damasak town, but suspicion immediately fell on a faction of extremists aligned with the Islamic State group. Last year the militants warned Nigerians they would become targets if they assisted international aid groups and the military.

Edward Kallon, United Nations Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in Nigeria, expressed concern for civilians and aid workers Sunday in the wake of the overnight attack.

“Humanitarian operations in Damasak will be reduced due to the violent attack, which will affect the support to 8,800 internally displaced people and 76,000 people in the host community receiving humanitarian assistance and protection there,” Kallon said in a statement.

The Norwegian Refugee Council said the attack “jeopardized our work and threatened the lives of many aid workers.”

“Thankfully our five staff staying in Damasak town escaped unharmed. However, the perpetrators succeeded in setting our guesthouse ablaze and destroying lifesaving relief supplies, including vehicles used to deliver aid, said Eric Batonon, country director for the aid group.

An insurgency aimed at establishing an Islamic state in northeast Nigeria has now lasted more than a decade.

Militants from Boko Haram and the group known as ISWAP frequently target humanitarian hubs in northeast Nigeria. The attack on Damasak is the fourth on the town and its surrounding area this year and the second attack on humanitarians in the past two months in northeast Nigeria.

By Sam Olukoya

AP

Nigerian air force jet goes missing

A Nigerian air force jet supporting ground troops fighting Boko Haram terrorists in northeast Borno city went missing, an official said on Thursday.

“The loss of radar contact occurred at about 5.08 p.m. [1608GMT] on 31 March 2021,” Edward Gabkwet, spokesman of the Nigerian Airforce, said in a statement.

The Alpha fighter jet was part of ongoing counter-insurgency operations in the North East region which has been ravaged by constant attacks by Boko Haram insurgents.

“Details of the whereabouts of the aircraft or likely cause of contact loss are still sketchy but will be relayed to the general public as soon as they become clear,” Gabkwet said.

The statement confirmed that search and rescue efforts are ongoing.

This incident comes a month after a Nigerian Airforce aircraft crashed at the Nigerian Airforce aircraft — killing all seven personnel on board.

CGTN

Boko Haram brutality against women and girls needs urgent response

Boko Haram fighters targeted women and girls with rape and other sexual violence, amounting to war crimes, during recent raids in northeast Nigeria, new research by Amnesty International has revealed.

In February and March 2021, Amnesty International interviewed 22 people in a cluster of villages in northern Borno State that Boko Haram has repeatedly attacked since late 2019.

During violent raids, Boko Haram fighters killed people trying to flee and looted livestock, money, and other valuables.

“As Boko Haram continue their relentless cycle of killings, abductions and looting, they are also subjecting women and girls to rape and other sexual violence during their attacks. These atrocities are war crimes,” said Osai Ojigho, Director of Amnesty International Nigeria.

“The targeted communities have been abandoned by the forces that are supposed to protect them, and are struggling to gain any recognition or response to the horrors they’ve suffered. The Nigerian authorities must urgently address this issue.

“The International Criminal Court must immediately open a full investigation into the atrocities committed by all sides, and ensure those responsible are held accountable, including for crimes against women and girls.”

After repeated displacement, the affected communities have mostly moved to military-controlled areas, but many have yet to receive any humanitarian assistance.

Rape and other sexual violence

Survivors and witnesses described attacks involving sexual violence in at least five villages in the Magumeri local government area of Borno State. During raids, usually at night, Boko Haram fighters raped women and girls who were caught at home or trying to flee.

One woman was physically assaulted by Boko Haram fighters as she fled from an attack in late 2020. She crawled to a home and hid there with her children, and saw fighters return and enter a nearby home.

She said: “In the next house, I started hearing some women were shouting and screaming and crying. I was very afraid. After some minutes, maybe 30 minutes, I saw the men come out of the house. There were five or six of them with their guns. Then afterwards, the women were confused. Their dresses were not normal.”

Amnesty International interviewed three other witnesses who similarly described the same attack, including hearing women’s screams and seeing them extremely distressed after Boko Haram left. A traditional healer said she cared for several women following the attack who had been raped.

The same healer had previously treated two other survivors, including one who was under 18 years old, after a Boko Haram attack on another village. She said: “I could see the pain on their faces. [The first survivor] told me what happened. I saw her private parts. They were very swollen. So I understood it was more than one or two people who had raped her. She was suffering.”

Another woman told Amnesty International that during the same attack fighters shot people who were running away, then came to her house and sexually assaulted her. She said: “The men entered my room. I asked what they wanted. They took my jewellery and belongings. Then they fell on me.”

Some witnesses also described Boko Haram abducting women during several attacks, taking them away on motorbikes. The women were returned to their village days later, showing clear signs of trauma.

Rape and other forms of sexual violence constitute war crimes in the context of the conflict, as defined under the Rome Statute.

No survivors Amnesty International interviewed appear to have accessed formal health services. Stigma and fear of repercussions mean such incidents are significantly underreported, even within affected communities. At least one of the survivors continues to suffer health complications some months later.

Access to abortion is illegal in Nigeria, except when life is at risk, which means survivors of rape do not have access to safe and legal abortion.

Killings and looting

During raids, Boko Haram fighters stole almost everything they could find. Witnesses consistently described fighters arriving on motorbikes and on foot, before firing into the air. In several attacks, Boko Haram targeted and murdered civilians as they fled; in one attack, several older people who were unable to flee were killed inside their homes.

Fighters often went house-to-house, rounding up livestock and stealing valuables including money, mobile phones, jewellery, and clothes. Witnesses described fighters loading the looted property onto their motorbikes, or on donkeys from the village. To steal livestock, fighters often forced young men to herd the animals into the forest.

A 40-year-old man whose village was raided told Amnesty International: “Before, if you came to our house, you’d see we had cows and goats. I didn’t have many, just a few, but with that I was content. Now, we have nothing… They took everything from us.”

Some fighters wore Nigerian military uniforms, while others wore traditional dress of the region. Witnesses said they knew the perpetrators belonged to Boko Haram, and not the Nigerian military, for several reasons. They could hear the fighters speaking languages common among Boko Haram members; the fighters came on motorbikes, not military vehicles; and the fighters dressed in a combination of attire. Even those fighters wearing stolen Nigerian military uniforms often wore sandals or had bare feet, instead of military boots.

Many witnesses also reported that some children, aged between 15 and 17, were among the attackers, along with men in their 20s.

Urgent response needed

After repeated attacks in recent months, communities from this cluster of villages fled to areas within the Nigerian military’s established perimeters. Many people settled less than a kilometre from an internally displaced persons (IDP) camp outside Maiduguri. Some tried to move into the camp, but were told it was full.

Officials from the nearby IDP camp visited and took people’s names, reportedly around two months ago, but no-one had returned since, according to everyone displaced to that location whom Amnesty International interviewed. Many women remain frustrated that no-one from the government or the humanitarian community has spoken with them to understand the targeting of women during attacks, and what support is needed now. Many added they wished the government would acknowledge and apologize for what happened, and bring the perpetrators to justice.

Months after settling near the IDP camp, the communities have still not received any assistance, including food, shelter, or health care. In early March, a young child died, and her family told Amnesty International she was malnourished and that they believed that factor contributed to her death. Everyone displaced near the camp described widespread hunger.

One woman told Amnesty International: “We need food assistance. All around us are malnourished children. Some of the women go to the camp, [but they’re] told to go away. Some are begging. Some [of us] are selling our things.”

“This is a humanitarian crisis that is getting worse day-by-day. The Nigerian authorities and partners must act now to support those most in need, and ensure this horrendous situation doesn’t continue to deteriorate,” said Osai Ojigho.

Background

The conflict in northeast Nigeria has created a humanitarian crisis, with more than 2,000,000 people now displaced. Boko Haram has also frequently targeted aid workers trying to respond to the crisis.

Amnesty International has repeatedly documented crimes under international law and other serious violations of international human rights and humanitarian law in northeast Nigeria.

The Nigerian authorities have not taken any genuine steps towards investigating and prosecuting crimes by Boko Haram or the Nigerian security forces, including crimes of sexual violence. Last December, the chief prosecutor of the ICC announced that her office had concluded a decade-long preliminary examination into the situation in Nigeria, saying that it had found sufficient evidence of crimes to open a full investigation. No formal investigation has yet been opened.

The conflict continues to have a dire impact on civilians, as documented in Amnesty International reports on the experience of women, children and older people.

Amnesty International

Related story: Video - Older people often an invisible casualty in conflict with Boko Haram in Nigeria

Boko Haram kills two Cameroonian soldiers in Nigeria

Two Cameroonian soldiers deployed to Nigeria were killed late Saturday in a Boko Haram attack in northeastern Borno state, two Nigerian military sources said Sunday.

The insurgents, on foot and in several trucks fitted with machine guns, attacked Nigerian soldiers outside the town of Wulgo. Cameroonian soldiers were then also attacked after deploying from across the border to assist.

“Two CDF (Cameroonian Defence Force) soldiers were killed in the 40-minute gunfight with the Boko Haram terrorists,” a Nigerian military source said.

“Another three CDF soldiers and a Nigerian soldier were injured in the fight,” said the military officer, in an account confirmed by a second Nigerian military source.

An armoured vehicle belonging to the Nigerian army and two Boko Haram trucks were destroyed in the fight while “several” jihadists were “neutralized”, the second military officer said.

The jihadists launched the attack from the nearby Wulgo forest, a known Boko Haram hideout.

The jihadist insurgency in northeast Nigeria has killed 36,000 people and displaced around two million from their homes since 2009, according to the United Nations.

The violence associated with Boko Haram and its splinter group ISWAP, the Islamic State West Africa Province, has spread to neighbouring Chad, Cameroon and Niger.

Earlier this month, ISWAP claimed in a statement that it used two vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices, killing and wounding 30 soldiers near Wulgo, a claim that AFP could not independently verify.

In 2015, a regional military coalition, the Multinational Joint Task Force (MNJTF) was tasked with fighting the insurgents.

Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari replaced the country’s top military commanders in January in a sudden overhaul after months of pressure over deteriorating security.

AFP 

Related story: Video - Older people often an invisible casualty in conflict with Boko Haram in Nigeria

Nigeria strengthens efforts to ensure school safety

The Nigerian Police has launched the Safer School Initiative campaign to strengthen school safety across the country, a police officer said Thursday.

The campaign is initiated under the nation’s public security framework to build a safe, peaceful and secure society, Ebere Amaraizu, the national coordinator of Police Campaign Against Cultism and Other Vices (POCACOV), told reporters in the southeast Nigerian city of Enugu.

The center has printed information booklets for students nationwide, Amaraizu said, adding that the move will “help them not yield to pressures of manipulation of minds by their peers and any other person.”

Additionally, “POCACOV fan clubs” will be built in all schools nationwide to improve education on school safety, he said.

CGTN

Related stories: 300 Nigerian students kidnapped by Boko Haram returning home

Nigeria State Says 16 Kidnapped Boys Rescued by Security Agents

Boko Haram claims responsibility for kidnapping hundreds of boys in Nigeria

Video - Over 300 schoolboys still missing after Nigeria school attack

Nearly 7 years later, Nigerian army still rescuing Chibok schoolgirls from Boko Haram

Nearly seven years since Islamist militants kidnapped two of his daughters from their school in northeastern Nigeria, a hurried phone call let Ali Maiyanga know that his family's ordeal might soon be over.

The call on Thursday evening was from Maiyanga's daughter Halima, who - along with her sister Maryam - was among more than 200 schoolgirls snatched by Boko Haram insurgents in Chibok in April 2014, sparking a global #BringBackOurGirls campaign.

"I was crying, she was crying," said Maiyanga, who was preparing to get married to his fourth wife when he heard Halima's voice down the line.

"We couldn't talk long because I was surrounded by so many people and the place was noisy. Everybody started jumping up and down when I told them," said Maiyanga, father of 18 children, who was reunited with his other kidnapped daughter in 2016.

Halima, 23, told him she had been rescued by the Nigerian army, but Maiyanga said he did not know her exact whereabouts or if she was alone or with more of her kidnapped former classmates.

An army spokesman said on Monday it did not have any Chibok kidnap victims in its custody and the government has not issued a statement about any of the missing women being found in recent days.

About half of the students who were abducted have escaped or been released so far.

Dozens have appeared in propaganda videos by the militants - showing them pleading for their rescue or pledging allegiance to the group - and some have died from illness, in childbirth or military air strikes, according to freed captives.

Reports by Boko Haram's victims of religious indoctrination and forced marriages have fueled concerns about the remaining women as attacks by Islamist militants gather pace in the northeast of the country.

Maryam, 24, said she and Halima - who were among the few Muslims kidnapped along with their mostly Christian classmates - were held captive together at first before they both married insurgents in 2014 and moved into different parts of the forest.

Maryam's husband decided to help his wife escape because he did not want their son to grow up in the forest, and she was found with their 10-month-old baby by troops in the Gwoza district of Borno State in November 2016.

"I always believed I would see my sister again one day," Maryam told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. "When I heard the news, I was jumping up and down. I was very happy. I can't wait to see her."

'I WAS AFRAID'

After the two sisters got married, they saw each other regularly. Halima used to visit Maryam every month, helping her to care for the baby. Maryam said she used to spend a lot of time consoling her sister after she had a stillbirth.

But when her escape was planned, Maryam did not tell her sister.

"I was afraid. I didn't see her before I left," said Maryam, who does not know the whereabouts of her husband since he was arrested by the military at the time of her escape. He had accompanied her out of the forest.

Since then, Maryam and the other freed Chibok girls were enrolled by the government in a special remedial course at the American University of Nigeria in Yola.

After years of mounting criticism about the spread of Islamist violence and attacks by armed gangs, Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari appointed a new military high command last week.

Hopes were high after army successes against Boko Haram in 2015 and 2016, but with the rise of Islamic State's West African branch, formerly part of Boko Haram, parts of the northeast have been experiencing more frequent attacks.

While Thursday's phone call put an end to the family's agonizing wait for news, Maiyanga said he still did not know when they would be able to see Halima.

"I'm hoping to hear more news from the military," he said.

By Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani

Reuters

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Armed group captures military base in northeast Nigeria

Government troops and hundreds of residents have been forced to flee after an armed group overran a town and captured a military base in northeast Nigeria’s Borno state in an attack claimed by the ISIL (ISIS) group, security sources said.

Machinegun-wielding fighters from the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) attacked the base in the town of Marte in the Lake Chad area overnight on Friday into Saturday, two sources told AFP news agency.

“The priority now is to reclaim the base from the terrorists and an operation is under way,” one of the sources said on Saturday.

“We took a hit from ISWAP terrorists. They raided the base in Marte after a fierce battle.”

The second source said the army had “incurred losses” but it was not yet clear how many people had died or the level of destruction inflicted by the armed group.

An army statement said troops “tactically withdrew” to defend against an attack outside Marte. Troops had “effectively destroyed” seven gun trucks and “decimated” an unconfirmed number of attackers, it said.

The ISIL later posted a statement on its Amaq news channel on Telegram claiming responsibility for the attack.

Without giving further details, it said seven people had been killed, and one captured, and that its fighters had seized weapons, ammunition and six four-wheel-drive vehicles, as well as burning down the army barracks.

Marte remained under the control of the armed group on Saturday, security sources told Reuters news agency.
 

Precarious situation

Friday’s assault came just two months after residents driven from their homes by the violence had returned to the town under a government programme.

It underscores the precarious security situation in northeast Nigeria, and the difficulties the government faces as it tries to return people displaced by the violence.

ISWAP, which split from Boko Haram in 2016, maintains camps on islands in Lake Chad – where Nigeria, Niger, Cameroon and Chad meet – and the area is known to be the group’s bastion.

Last week, the fighters attacked the Marte base but were repelled, prompting them to mobilise more fighters for the overnight raid, sources said.

The raid was seen as a “fightback” after recent losses – troops recently overran ISWAP’s second-largest camp in Talala village, according to sources.

The town, 130km (80 miles) from the regional capital Maiduguri, was once considered the breadbasket of the Lake Chad region.

At least 36,000 people have been killed in the armed conflict since 2009 and violence has spread into neighbouring Niger, Chad and Cameroon, prompting the formation of a regional military coalition.


Al Jazeera

Global media's Nigeria abductions coverage 'wrong'

The frenzied journalism that followed the 2014 abduction by militant Islamist group Boko Haram of more than 200 girls from their school in Chibok, north-east Nigeria, may have been well-meaning but it led to some unfortunate outcomes.

Prior to the Chibok incident, Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau was just a fringe figure that Nigerians saw on TV once in a while.

When he stabbed at the camera with his fingers and guffawed wildly while threatening everyone from Nigeria's then-President Goodluck Jonathan to the US president at the time, Barack Obama, with death and destruction, many of us wondered: Who did this unkempt man really think he was?

But, in the aftermath of Chibok media organisations around the world broadcast and rebroadcast Shekau's slightest remark.

And he kept them supplied with material, such as videos of the kidnapped schoolgirls whom he promised to sell

Those who were abducted have subsequently described how the militants who held them captive revelled in any news about the incident. The Chibok coverage inflated Shekau's value as a media commodity, making it increasingly rewarding to keep him on the airwaves.

It also distorted the story itself.

Despite the way it was covered by the international media, the Chibok kidnappings had nothing to do with "an attack on girls' education", rather it was banditry gone wrong.

When they were released after more than two years in Boko Haram captivity, some of those held described how the militants who attacked their school were simply on a mission to loot and steal.



'Militants build a global brand'

After emptying out the school's storeroom of food, they were then left with the problem of what to do with the students and began arguing.

One suggested that that they lock the girls in a dormitory and set them on fire. Another suggested that they use the girls to gain access to their parents' homes nearby and then steal some more food.

Eventually, one man came up with the idea that would lead to infamy: "Let us take them to Shekau. He will know what to do."

This same account was recorded in a report by New York-based group Human Rights Watch based on interviews with some of the 57 students who managed to escape on the night of the kidnapping by jumping off the trucks used to ferry them away.

Although published a few months after the incident, little attention was paid to that detail.

Determined to make the Boko Haram attacks about the irresistible theme of terrorists targeting female education, some media outlets ignored any thread that did not fit this narrative.

Just a few weeks before the Chibok incident, Boko Haram had attacked a school in the north-east town of Burni Yadi and allowed female students to flee before slaughtering 40 boys in their dormitory.

The Burni Yadi incident attracted little media attention until after the Chibok kidnappings, but this additional knowledge did nothing to sway the direction of reporting.

In many cases the media insisted on viewing the Chibok incident through the lens of gender violence, unwittingly providing Boko Haram with the guidance they needed to build their global brand.

Boko Haram's use of women as suicide bombers skyrocketed after the Chibok kidnappings, according to a 2017 report by Combating Terrorism Center at West Point and Yale University, suggesting that the group adopted the tactic to grab headlines and elicit shock and awe.

It soon became the first terror group in history to use more female suicide bombers than male, sending at least 80 women to their deaths in 2017 alone.

"Through the global response to the Chibok abductions, the insurgents learned the potent symbolic value of young female bodies... that using them as bombers would attract attention," said Hilary Matfess, co-author of the report.

'Celebrity monster'

In February 2018, another 110 girls were kidnapped by Boko Haram from their school in the north-east town of Dapchi.

In the past few years, the government of President Muhammadu Buhari has severely curtailed Boko Haram's impact in north-east Nigeria.

Its attacks are much fewer, their hold on international headlines lasting for hours rather than what used to be days or months. But another security crisis has risen elsewhere.

Gunmen, popularly referred to by government officials and local media as "bandits", have been terrorising north-west Nigeria with robberies and kidnappings.

Politicians, entrepreneurs, commuters and even schoolchildren have been kidnapped at various times and released after a ransom was paid, although not on the scale seen in December when more than 300 boys were abducted from their boarding school on the outskirts of Kankara town last month.

Nigerian security agents and officials of the Kankara community stated that the boys were taken by bandits.

But when the international media swooped in and amplified the apparent link to the Chibok incident of more than six years before, Shekau must have seen an opportunity.

A whole three days after the Kankara kidnapping, Boko Haram said it was behind the attack. And, once again, many international outlets presented their platforms for this celebrity monster to dance and display. And, in the process, ran wild with a faulty narrative, ignoring all evidence to the contrary.

 

'Shekau's megalomaniac commentary'

The numerous headlines that unquestioningly attributed the Kankara kidnappings to Boko Haram failed to consider by what miracle the group had expanded from its decimated operations in the north-east to the north-west, two regions that are vast and separate.

Not even in its prime did Boko Haram brazenly operate in the north-west.

The most the militants achieved was a few, albeit deadly, suicide bomb attacks.

In a similar manner by which he fanned his popularity in 2014, Shekau fed the media with megalomaniac commentary and a video allegedly of the Kankara boys.

Local media, while worried about the increasing insecurity in Nigeria, was more sceptical about the Boko Haram angle.

When Nigeria's Cable newspaper took the time to show the video to some of the parents, many of whom do not have internet facilities and so had to rely on secondary sources to view it, they described the recording as fake.

"Why are they playing tricks on us?" the parents asked. "This video is not genuine. It does not show our children."

Nevertheless, the voices of the parents were drowned in the sea of global media coverage, which appeared unbending in the determination to connect this incident with Chibok.

Some international security experts suggested that while direct Boko Haram involvement seems to have been discounted, Boko Haram training, help and encouragement were involved.

Many Nigerians believe that Boko Haram took interest only after the international media covered the story. The government insisted no ransom was paid to the kidnappers, who it continued to describe as "bandits".

Media coverage of such heinous acts is important: governments need to be encouraged to act, victims need to be remembered and memorialised and the public needs to be warned.

But all this can be done without inspiring more criminals and without providing them tutorials.

By Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani

BBC

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Two police officers arrested for the kidnapping of Okonjo-Iweala's Mother

Boko Haram Landmines Kill 11 Nigerian Security Personnel

Landmines planted by Boko Haram jihadists have killed 11 security personnel, including four soldiers in northeast Nigeria, security sources said Tuesday.

Seven hunters recruited to help the military fight the Islamist insurgents were killed on Tuesday when their vehicle hit a landmine in the village of Kayamla, outside Borno State's capital Maiduguri.

"Seven hunters died in the explosion and nine others are badly injured," Babakura Kolo, the head of a local anti-jihadist militia, told AFP.

"Their vehicle hit a landmine as they were pursuing Boko Haram insurgents," he added.

Another local militiaman confirmed the incident.

Four Nigerian soldiers were killed on Monday when their vehicle hit a landmine planted by Boko Haram fighters in Logomani village near the border with Cameroon, two security sources told AFP.

There has been a sharp increase in attacks in northeast Nigeria since the start of the month.

Last week 40 loggers were kidnapped and three killed near the Cameroonian border.

On Christmas Eve, Boko Haram killed 11 people, burnt a church and seized a priest in a village near Chibok, where it notoriously kidnapped more than 200 schoolgirls six years ago.

Boko Haram and a splinter group known as ISWAP have killed 36,000 people in the northeast and forced roughly two million to flee since 2009, according to the United Nations.

AFP

At least 40 feared abducted in northeast Nigeria

Three loggers have been found dead and at least 40 more feared abducted by Boko Haram fighters in northeastern Nigeria.

Sources and residents told AFP news agency on Saturday that the loggers were rounded up by the fighters on Thursday in Wulgo forest near the town of Gamboru where they went to collect firewood.

“A group of more than 40 loggers left Shehuri on the outskirts of Gamboru on Thursday and never returned by evening as usual,” said a group leader Umar Kachalla, who was involved in the search.

“On Friday, we mobilised men and went deep into the forest where we recovered three bodies identified to be among the loggers, without a trace of their colleagues.”

The missing loggers were presumed kidnapped by the group, who are known to maintain camps in the forest, said Kachalla, a view widely shared by other residents.

The fighters have increasingly targeted loggers and farmers in the northeast, accusing them of passing information to the military and local armed groups.
 

‘Shot from behind’

“We believe the men were taken by Boko Haram who have been attacking loggers in the forest,” said Shehu Mada, leader of another armed group.

“From all indication, the three dead loggers were shot when they tried to escape as they all were shot from behind.”

The area has been without telephone services for years following the destruction of masts in Boko Haram attacks, forcing residents to rely on Cameroon’s mobile phone networks.

Gamboru loggers have suffered repeated Boko Haram attacks and abductions, especially around Wulgo forest.

In November 2018, Boko Haram seized some 50 loggers on their way to collect firewood in the forest, after killing 49 loggers in two previous attacks.

Babandi Abdullahi, a resident, said military officials had warned loggers not to venture deep into the forest to avoid the attacks.

People are compelled to take that risk because nearby vegetation has been depleted by constant logging, Abdullahi said.

According to the UN, Boko Haram and a splinter group known as ISWAP have killed 36,000 people in the northeast and forced roughly two million to flee since 2009.

Earlier this month, Boko Haram claimed responsibility for the kidnapping of more than 300 schoolboys who were taken after an attack on their school in Katsina’s Kankara village, in northwest Nigeria. All the boys have since been rescued.

Al Jazeera

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Boko Haram claims responsibility for kidnapping hundreds of boys in Nigeria 

Nigeria is also losing control of its troubled northwest region

Video - Over 300 schoolboys still missing after Nigeria school attack

Video - Freed schoolboys arrive in Nigeria’s Katsina week after abduction

More than 300 schoolboys who were kidnapped in northwestern Nigeria a week ago have arrived in Katsina city where they will be reunited with their families. They will first be checked by doctors. The boys were taken on Friday last week by gunmen, thought to be linked to Boko Haram, who raided a school. Al Jazeera's Ahmed Idris reports live outside the government house of Katsina state.

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Boko Haram kidnapped 300 children in addition to the 200 schoolgirls still missing

300 Nigerian students kidnapped by Boko Haram returning home

More than 300 schoolboys abducted last week by armed men in northwest Nigeria have been released, a government official said Thursday.

In an announcement on Nigerian state TV, NTA, Katsina State Gov. Aminu Bello Masari said the 344 boarding school students were turned over to security officials and were being brought to the state capital, where they will get physical examinations before being reunited with their families.

“I think we can say … we have recovered most of the boys, if not all of them,” Masari said. He did not disclose if the government paid any ransom.

President Muhammadu Buhari welcomed their release, calling it “a big relief to their families, the entire country and to the international community,” according to a statement from his office. Amid an outcry in the West African nation over insecurity in the north, Buhari noted his administration’s successful efforts to secure the release of previously abducted students. He added that the government “is acutely aware of its responsibility to protect the life and property of the Nigerians.”

“We have a lot of work to do, especially now that we have reopened the borders,” Buhari said, acknowledging that the Northwest region “presents a problem” the administration “is determined to deal with.”

Boko Haram claimed responsibility for last Friday’s abduction of the students from the all-boys Government Science Secondary School in the Katsina State village of Kankara. The jihadist group carried out the attack because it believes Western education is un-Islamic, factional leader Abubakar Shekau said in a video earlier this week. More than 800 students were in attendance at the time of the attack. Hundreds escaped, but it was believed that more than 330 were taken.

For more than 10 years, Boko Haram has engaged in a bloody campaign to introduce strict Islamic rule in Nigeria’s north. Thousands have been killed and more than 1 million have been displaced by the violence. The group has been mainly active in northeast Nigeria, but with the abductions from the school in Kankara, there is worry the insurgency is expanding to the northwest.

The government had said it was negotiating with the school attackers, originally described as bandits. Experts say the attack was likely carried out by local gangs, who have staged increasingly deadly assaults in northwest Nigeria this year, and could possibly have been collaborating with Boko Haram. Armed bandits have killed more than 1,100 people since the beginning of the year in the region, according to Amnesty International.

Parents of the missing students have been gathering daily at the school in Kankara. News of the students’ release came shortly after the release of a video Thursday by Boko Haram that purportedly showed the abducted boys.

In the more than six-minute video seen by Associated Press journalists, the apparent captors tell one boy to repeat their demands that the government call off its search for them by troops and aircraft.

The video circulated widely on WhatsApp and first appeared on a Nigerian news site, HumAngle, that often reports on Boko Haram.

Usama Aminu, a 17-year-old kidnapped student who was eventually able to escape, told the AP that his captors wore military uniforms. He said he also saw gun-toting teens, some younger than him, aiding the attackers.

He said the kidnapped boys tried to help each other as bandits flogged them from behind to get them to move faster and forced them to lie down under large trees when helicopters were heard above.

Aminu escaped at night. He was able to return home after being found by a resident in a mosque who gave him a change of clothes and money.

Government officials said earlier this week that police, the air force and the army tracked the kidnappers to a hideout in the Zango/Paula forest.

Katsina state shut down all its boarding schools to prevent other abductions. The nearby states of Zamfara, Jigiwa and Kano also have closed schools as a precaution.

Masari said the government will work with the police to increase private security at the Kankara school “to make sure that we don’t experience what we have experienced in the last six days.”

Only one policeman was working at the school when it was attacked.

Friday’s abduction was a chilling reminder of Boko Haram’s previous attacks on schools. In February 2014, 59 boys were killed when the jihadists attacked the Federal Government College Buni Yadi in Yobe state.

In April 2014, Boko Haram kidnapped more than 270 schoolgirls from a government boarding school in Chibok in northeastern Borno state. About 100 of those girls are still missing.

In 2018, Boko Haram Islamic extremists brought back nearly all of the 110 girls they had kidnapped from a boarding school in Dapchi and warned: “Don’t ever put your daughters in school again.”

By Carley Petesch And Haruna Umar 

AP

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Video - Over 300 schoolboys still missing after Nigeria school attack

Families of kidnapped Nigerian boys fear time running out

Families of more than 300 kidnapped Nigerian schoolboys worried they may be radicalised or held for years as security forces combed a vast forest on Wednesday for armed captors possibly from the jihadist Boko Haram movement.

According to an unverified audio clip, the group - whose name means “Western education is forbidden” - was responsible for last week’s raid on an all-boys school in the town of Kankara in northwestern Katsina state.

Parents fear time may be running out: Boko Haram has a history of turning captives into jihadist fighters.

“They will radicalise our children if the government does not act fast to help us rescue them,” said trader Shuaibu Kankara, crying as he spoke from home.

His 13-year-old son, Annas, was among those abducted from the Government Science school on Friday night.

Two other sons managed to escape, he added, when men on motorbikes with AK-47 assault rifles stormed the school and marched the boys into a forest.

Some experts feared the boys could be taken over the border into Niger or at least split into groups to make finding them harder.

Late on Wednesday, Katsina state Governor Aminu Bello Masari told the BBC Hausa service that the estimated 320 missing boys were in the forests of neighbouring Zamfara state.

Earlier in the day, an aide to Masari said soldiers and intelligence officers had been combing the Rugu forest, which stretches across Katsina, Zamfara, Kaduna and Niger states, in search of the boys.

Boko Haram and its offshoot, Islamic State West Africa Province, have waged a decade-long insurgency estimated to have displaced about 2 million people and killed more than 30,000. They want to create states based on their extreme interpretation of sharia law.

If Boko Haram carried out the kidnapping in an area where it had not previously claimed attacks, it would mark an alarming expansion beyond its northeastern base, security experts say. But it may alternatively have purchased the boys from criminal gangs in the northwest with which it has been building ties.

Vincent Foucher, a security analyst at the French National Centre for Scientific Research, said Boko Haram earlier this year released videos in which it said groups in the northwest had pledged allegiance to its movement.
CHIBOK GIRLS REMEMBERED

The abduction echoes Boko Haram’s 2014 kidnapping of more than 270 schoolgirls in the northeastern town of Chibok. The attack gave rise to a global #BringBackOurGirls campaign.

Six years on, only about half the girls have been found or freed. Others were married off to fighters, while some are assumed to be dead.

“We pray it’s not going to be another situation of the Chibok girls’ abduction,” said Ahmed Bakori, a farmer whose 14-year-old son, Abubakar, was among those taken.

About two dozen parents came to the Government Science compound on Wednesday and prayed in the school mosque. The compound, composed of white single-storey buildings built on dusty red soil, was quiet.

Abubakar Lawal, who has two children among the captives, said he did not believe Boko Haram’s claim and would wait with patience and prayers. “The government has to do diplomacy in a way to rescue these people,” he said outside the school.

The attack is awkward for President Muhammadu Buhari, who comes from Katsina and arrived on a private visit hours before the kidnapping. Buhari has repeatedly said that Boko Haram has been “technically defeated.”

A former military ruler, Buhari was elected in 2015 in large part due to his pledge to crush the insurgency. Under his predecessor, Goodluck Jonathan, Boko Haram grew in strength and controlled territory around the size of Belgium.

Across the nation, anger and anxiety were building over the abductions, with #BringBackOurBoys trending on Twitter.

Military spokesman John Enenche said troops were determined to rescue the boys alive and had no evidence any were dead.

He gave new details of the school attack and subsequent firefight with guards. Soldiers arrived but could only shoot in the air as the assailants used the boys as shields.

Jacob Zenn, a Boko Haram expert at the U.S.-based Jamestown Foundation think tank, said the longer the boys were with their captors, the likelier their indoctrination would be. He cited the example of some Chibok girls who chose to stay with Boko Haram.

“The longer this goes on, the more pressure will grow on the government to negotiate, and the more leverage the militants will have over the government,” he added.

By Afolabi Sotunde

Reuters

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Nigeria State Says 16 Kidnapped Boys Rescued by Security Agents

At least 15 students kidnapped by gunmen from a school in northern Nigeria were rescued by the military, a state government official said.

One other student was rescued by the police while another escaped from the kidnappers, Abdu Labaran, a spokesman for Katsina Governor Aminu Masari, said by phone on Tuesday.

At least 337 students were reported missing after gunmen attacked a boys’ boarding school in the northern state of Katsina.

“The government is not into any negotiations with the bandits. It’s also not ready to negotiate, as doing so would amount to capitulation and this would encourage the bandits,” Labaran said.

Armed assailants entered the town of Kankara on Dec. 11 and opened fire before entering the boys’ school, causing students and staff to flee while an unknown number were forcefully taken away.

Nigerian Islamist militant group Boko Haram has claimed responsibility for the kidnap, Abuja-based Daily Trust reported on Tuesday, citing an audio clip it said was released by the leader, Abubakar Shekau. 

By Mustapha Adamu and Ruth Oluroundbi

Bloomberg

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Boko Haram kidnapped 300 children in addition to the 200 schoolgirls still missing