on june 02, 2014 at 12:07 am in headlines
A screengrab taken on May 12, 2014, from a
video of Nigerian Islamist extremist group
Boko Haram obtained by AFP shows girls,
wearing the full-length hijab and praying in
an undisclosed rural location.
You might also like
By Uduma Kalu, with agency report
LAGOS—President Goodluck Jonathan has
reportedly seen a new video released by Boko
Haram, where the abducted school girls of
Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok,
Borno State, spoke about their ordeal in the
hands of the insurgents for the first time and
pleaded with him to secure their release.
The girls were reportedly ill and are in camps
located in Chad, Niger and Cameroon, with
one of them nursing a broken wrist.
The footage, not released publicly but seen by
the London-based The Mail on Sunday was
taken in a jungle clearing a month after their
abduction.
More than 250 girls were taken in a raid on
their school in Chibok on April 14 by Boko
Haram terrorists.
However, Cameroon’s military reportedly killed
about 40 Boko Haram militants in the
country’s northwest last weekend, a
government radio reported yesterday, a day
after Nigeria labelled the Central African
nation the weakest link in its fight against the
extremist sect.
The clashes leading to the killing occurred in
the town of Kouserri, which borders Nigeria
and Chad.
Cameroon, a clog in the wheel
The Federal Government regards Cameroun as
not cooperative as Niger and Chad in the fight
against Boko Haram.
After a security summit in Paris two weeks
ago, Cameroon said it deployed 1,000 troops
to its border to help contain the increasingly
deadly group.
A series of suspected Boko Haram attacks in
four villages in Nigeria’s restive North-East
killed several people, residents said Sunday, in
the latest violence blamed on the Islamist
insurgents.
The military was not immediately available to
comment on the raids in Borno State, the
hardest hit area during Boko Haram’s five-
year extremist uprising, which has killed
thousands.
All of the targeted villages are in the Gamboru
Ngala district near the border with Cameroon,
where Boko Haram killed hundreds in a
gruesome attack earlier last month.
The video, according to The Mail of London,
indicated that the girls looked healthy, as
eight of them, dressed in their home-made
school uniforms of pale blue gingham, pleaded
for release while standing courageously in
front of the camera.
They were reportedly clearly scared, upset and
trying to be brave, with each walking in turn to
a spot in front of a white sheet fixed to a
crude frame between the trees.
According to The Mail, four of the girls can be
heard clearly in Hausa language stating that
they were taken by force and that they were
hungry.
The video indicated that a tall girl, aged about
18, said tearfully that “My family will be so
worried”, even as another spoke softly, saying
‘I never expected to suffer like this in my life.”
Similarly, a third girl was captured in the
video as saying ‘they have taken us away by
force’, while the fourth complained of not
getting enough food.
Boko Haram leader, Abubakar Shekau,
reportedly released the new video of the
kidnapped girls praying after their conversion
to Islam.
The video, taken by an intermediary on May
19, has been shown to President Goodluck
Jonathan and was intended to serve as ‘proof
of life’ for the girls and to encourage the
President to accede to the terrorists’ demands.
Two earlier videos showed the girls seated on
the ground, dressed in hijabs, reciting the
Koran,with Boko Haram leader, Abubakar
Shekau, declaring he would sell them into
slavery, or marry them off to their kidnappers,
if members of his sect were not released from
prison.
The Mail said pressure from the international
community and criticism of the President’s
slow response to the kidnapping have led to a
series of contradictory pronouncements from
his government. Ministers have declared they
will not negotiate with Boko Haram, or
consider the release of prisoners, while official
spokesmen have said ‘the window is always
open for dialogue’.
At a Paris peace summit, several West African
countries neighbouring Nigeria vowed to join
in ‘outright war’ against the terrorists. Britain,
France and America pledged their support and
have sent teams of military experts and
advisers to the region. Intelligence sources
have told The Mail of several rescue attempts,
one involving the release of suspected low-
level Boko Haram members detained without
charges or trial.
Two attempts were aborted at the last minute
when the terrorists took fright while delivering
a group of girls to a safe location.
Last week, Chief of Defence Staff, Alex Badeh
said the government knew the location of the
girls and claimed that police and military had
been ‘following them’ since the abduction. He
refused to divulge details, saying it would put
the girls in further danger.
The Mail claimed that Badeh’s announcement
may have been the result of government
officials seeing the new, unpublished video
and may have been able to persuade Boko
Haram’s intermediary to provide details of the
location. It is believed the hostages have been
split into at least four groups.
The report said one Dr Stephen Davis, an
Australian who has advised three Nigerian
presidents on how to negotiate with the
country’s militant groups, has spent the past
month trying to help free the girls.
Most Chibok girls not held in Nigeria
‘The vast majority of the Chibok girls are not
being held in Nigeria,’ he said.
‘They are in camps across the Nigerian border
in Cameroon, Chad and Niger. I say the “vast
majority” as I know a small group was
confirmed to me to be in Nigeria last week
when we sought to have them released.’
Saying the Federal Government has been
engaged in negotiations with Boko Haram’s
spiritual leader Abubakar Shekau in a bid to
secure the girls’ release, the report quoted the
Australian describing how fraught the
negotiation process has been.
‘One of that small group of girls is ill and we
had hoped we might convince the commander
of the group holding her that she should be
released so we could give her medical
treatment,’ Dr Davis said.
‘There are other girls who are not well and we
have come close to having them released but
their captors fear a trap in which they will be
captured in the handover process.
‘One girl has what I assume is a broken wrist
as they demonstrate to me how she holds her
hand. I have been told that others are sick
and in need of medical attention.’
A military source said: ‘This has been a race
against time from the minute they were
captured. As soon as the girls left Nigerian
soil, it was always going to be more difficult.
‘The government made no attempt at a rescue
until a month after they were taken. Now the
situation gets more serious by the day.
‘Any sort of attempt to get to them would
have to be cleared by the governments of the
other nations.’
No comments:
Post a Comment