Officials in Nigeria along with UN officials say that over 200 of the nearly 700 women and girls rescued from the Islamic extremist group Boko Haram have been forcibly impregnated by their captors.
“Already, many of them are undergoing screening for various diseases [and] infections, including HIV/AIDS,” UNFPA Nigeria executive director Babatunde Oshotimehin told reporters, “and about 214 of those already screened were discovered to be at various stages of pregnancies, some visibly pregnant and some just tested pregnant.”
The governor of Borno State, Kashim Shettima, had been expressing concern over the forced impregnations of the women saying he believes the terrorists are showing one way they hope to spread their extremism across the land.
“Boko Haram insurgents deliberately raped women with the intention of getting them pregnant so they would give birth to future insurgents as successors of their violent struggles, hence the need for a special programm to break the chain anticipated by the insurgents,” spokesperson Isa Gusau said on Monday, according to the Nigerian publication “The Leadership.”
“I [am] very worried about what the future holds for us if what I have gathered about these insurgents works according to their plan,” he continued. “These people (Boko Haram) have a certain spiritual conviction that any child they father will grow to inherit their ideology, whether they live with the children or not.”
The government said they will be providing all the necessary support to the women after their rescue including mental health efforts to reverse any brainwashing by the terrorists.
Officials did say they believe that none of the recovered girls were among the Chibok girls taken in 2013.
The Nigerian Army’s successes against the Islamic terrorist group Boko Haram continued this weekend with the rescue of more captured women.
Military officials say that 234 more women and girls were taken from a Boko Haram stronghold in the Sambia Forest. The total number of women and children rescued in the last week from the terrorists reached 527.
The girls and women are being given counseling to help them with the brainwashing attempts of the terrorists. Some of the women actually fired on the troops, leading officials to say that after forced marriages and long captivity, some of the women have been successfully convinced they are part of the terror network.
The military was unable to say if any of the captives were part of the 200 schoolgirls taken from Chibok that led to the #BringBackOurGirls campaign. The leader of Boko Haram had said those girls would be sold to other members of Boko Haram.
“I abducted your girls,” Shekau said in a 57-minute video earlier. “I abducted a girl at a western education school and you are disturbed. I said western education should end. Western education should end. Girls, you should go and get married. I will repeat this: western education should fold up. I abducted your girls. I will sell them in the market, by Allah. I will marry off a woman at the age of 12. I will marry off a girl at the age of nine.”
Another major victory by the Nigerian army in their battle against the Islamic extremist group Boko Haram.
Military officials on Thursday announced the rescue of another 100 women and 50 girls from a campsite in the remote Sambisa Forest where the terrorists have been maintaining a stronghold.
The army said that the terrorists were using brainwashed women as soldiers and as human shields in their fight with troops. Col. Sani Usman said that one soldier and one woman died during shootouts with nine terrorist encampments in the Sambisa Forest.
The rescued women and children are in a safety zone for medical attention and processing according to Usman. He said many of the women were “severely traumatized.”
The raid also resulted in the deaths of several Boko Haram field commanders. The troops captured combat tanks and high caliber munitions that were taken to military installations or destroyed in the camps.
Amnesty International stated in April that at least 2,000 women and girls have been taken captive by the terrorists since the beginning of 2014.
A mysterious disease in Ondo State, Nigeria has left at least 18 people dead since April 13th.
Dr. Dayo Adeyanju, the state commissioner for health, told reporters that 18 people died and 5 others are being treated. Preliminary tests indicate the disease is not contagious according to Dr. Adeyanju.
The symptoms include headaches, blurred vision, blindness and unconsciousness. Victims die within 24 hours of showing symptoms.
Speculation centers on locally brewed alcohol or herbicide.
The World Health Organization (WHO) released numbers that conflicted with Dr. Adeyanju, stating that 13 people were killed in 18 total cases. The WHO said tests in Lagos ruled out viruses and bacteria.
WHO spokesman Dr. Tarik Jasarevic said that they would be conducting toxicological tests on one of the dead to try and determine the source.
Those infected have been quarantined at the General Hospital in Irele and the rest of the hospital has been cleared of patients.
Residents of the Nigerian border town of Gamboru had just returned after the village was liberated by Cameroon military forces when Boko Haram staged a surprise attack.
The attack left 11 residents dead before the troops could re-cross the border and drive out the terrorists.
“We were terrified when we started hearing gunshots echoing … but everywhere became calm about an hour later. The soldiers informed us that it was the Boko Haram terrorists that came back”, resident Aji Kaumi told the Associated Press.
It was the first offensive attack by the terrorists since they have been driven out of 38 cities and two entire states by the multinational forces helping the Nigerian military.
France has also sent military advisors into the region and French aircraft based in Chad are making scouting missions to find terrorist encampments.
French officials told reporters the goal is to make Boko Haram what it was once was: a fringe extremist group without any control of land within Nigeria.
Long rumored to be happening, the Nigerian Islamic terrorist group Boko Haram has pledged their allegiance to ISIS and is calling on Muslims around the world to do the same.
“We announce our allegiance to the Caliph of the Muslims … and will hear and obey in times of difficulty and prosperity, in hardship and ease, and to endure being discriminated against, and not to dispute about rule with those in power, except in case of evident infidelity regarding that which there is a proof from Allah,” leader Abubakar Shekau said in an audio recording posted to Twitter on Saturday. “We call upon Muslims everywhere to pledge allegiance to the Caliph.”
Boko Haram, which has been attempting to form their own caliphate since 2009, has been releasing videos stating that Islam is commanded to take over the world and that they would not stop until every Christian in the world was killed.
“Boko Haram joining the ISIS fold makes sense to both groups,” Jacob Zenn with the Jamestown Foundation told CNN. “Boko Haram will get legitimacy, which will help its recruiting, funding and logistics as it expands into (French-speaking) West Africa. It will also get guidance from ISIS in media warfare and propaganda. Previously Boko Haram was a sort of outcast in the global Jihadi community. Now it is perhaps ISIS’s biggest affiliate.”
The announcement by Boko Haram marks the 31st terrorist group to pledge allegiance to ISIS.
An American missionary kidnapped in Nigeria has been freed.
Rev. Phyllis Sortor, a member of the American Free Methodist Church, was freed by a gang of criminals on Friday according to a church statement.
“Early evening Nigeria time, Friday, March 6, Phyllis Sortor, Free Methodist missionary to Nigeria, was safely released into the care of authorities and Free Methodist church leaders,” noted David W. Kendall, for the Board of Bishops in a news release to The Christian Post Friday evening.
“It appears she was kidnapped by a criminal gang, and there is no evidence this event is associated with terrorism or religion. Free Methodist leaders express deep appreciation to all who prayed for Sortor’s safe return.”
The criminals had asked for $300,000 as a ransom but the church did not comment on whether any ransom had been paid for the missionary’s release.
Sortor had travelled the world as a minister for Christ with her husband until his death in 2008. After his death, she remained in Nigeria to focus on child care ministries.
Islamic terrorist group Boko Haram has released their first public video showing the beheading of two men they claim are “spies.”
“This latest release shows Boko Haram is not a mere copycat of ISIS; rather, it is incorporating itself into the Islamic State,” said Veryan Khan, editorial director of Terrorism Research & Analysis Consortium.
“Islamic state supporters are already starting to call Boko Haram the ‘Islamic State Africa.'”
The video shows a farmer being beaten by Islamic state terrorists and forced to “confess” he was “spying” for local police. The video then shows the farmer and another man beheaded with their hands folded on their chests.
I believe Boko Haram is more than just copying the Islamic State — their image is being ‘shaped’ at very least in the ISIS media wing,” he continued. “Immediately after Baghdadi declared the Islamic State Caliphate, Boko Haram’s leader Abubakar Shekau did the same. We then started seeing (in the videos) the Islamic State flags being painted onto Boko Haram’s most prized possessions, their AFVs and tanks, most recently on Feb. 20 during the ops within the Northeastern Nigeria border.”
Analysts say that Boko Haram’s leader, Abubakar Shekau, is insane and too extreme even for Boko Haram. They say that Shekau mixes voodoo into his version of radical Islam.
An American missionary has been taken captive in Lagos, Nigeria.
Kogi state Police Commissioner Adeyemi Ogunjemilusi said that five men stormed the workplace of Rev. Phyllis Sortor and forced the woman out of the building. The kidnappers are demanding a ransom of 60 million Naira (about $300,000 U.S.).
The kidnapping took place Monday and while Lagos is away from the main areas of operation for Islamic extremist group Boko Haram, police officials could not say the kidnapping was not related to terrorism. They said it’s possible the group is connected in some way or could sell the woman to the terrorist outfit.
Sortor runs an organization that provides schools for nomadic children in Nigeria.
Commissioner Ogunjamilusi said that the attackers scaled a wall of the school and then fled into the nearby mountains.
In their latest assault on civilians, terrorist group Boko Haram has used a girl believed to be around 7 years old on a homicide bombing.
The attack happened in Potiskum in the northeastern part of Nigeria. The attack killed five people along with the girl and sent 19 others to various hospitals.
The girl had been seen around a market by security guards who kept sending the girl away because “given her age, she did not have anything to do in the market.” The security guards had been screening people for explosives before allowing them into the market when the girl detonated her device.
Security officials could not say if the girl was one of the 200 kidnapped from a boarding school in Borno state in April 2014.