Since 2013, more than 1,000 kids abducted by Boko Haram in Nigeria: UNICEF

As Nigeria prepares to mark the fourth anniversary of the Chibok kidnapping, UNICEF reported on Friday that over 1,000 children have been abducted by jihadists since 2013.

"Since 2013, more than 1,000 children have been abducted by Boko Haram in northeastern Nigeria, including 276 girls taken from their secondary school in the town of Chibok in 2014," said UNICEF in a statement.

"These repeated attacks against children in schools are unconscionable," Mohamed Malick Fall, a UNICEF representative in Nigeria.

Boko Haram's fight to establish a hardline Islamic state in northeast Nigeria has claimed at least 20,000 lives and displaced more than two million people.

Schools, particularly those with a secular curriculum, have been targeted by Boko Haram, whose name roughly translates from Hausa -- the language spoken widely across northern Nigeria -- as "Western education is forbidden".

Boko Haram free scores of abducted Dapchi schoolgirls in Nigeria

Boko Haram jihadists have released 76 of the 110 schoolgirls who were abducted from the northeastern town of Dapchi in February, the government said in a statement on Wednesday.

Information Minister Lai Mohammed said "the 76 are those who have been documented", adding that the release of the abducted students "is ongoing".

The schoolgirls were returned to Dapchi by Boko Haram early Wednesday morning following negotiations between the Nigerian government and the militant group.

"The girls were released around 3:00 am (0200 GMT) through back-channel efforts and with the help of some friends of the country," said Mohammed, without elaborating.

The number of freed girls may increase "because the girls were not handed over to anyone but dropped off in Dapchi," he said.

Boko Haram strapped suicide bombs to teenagers but somehow they survived

The girls didn’t want to kill anyone. They walked in silence for a while, the weight of the explosives around their waists pulling down on them as they fingered the detonators and tried to think of a way out.

“I don’t know how to get this thing off me,” Hadiza, 16, recalled saying as she headed out on her mission.

“What are you going to do with yours?” she asked the 12-year-old girl next to her, who was also wearing a bomb.

“I’m going to go off by myself and blow myself up,” the girl responded hopelessly.

It was all happening so fast. After being kidnapped by Boko Haram this year, Hadiza was confronted by a fighter in the camp where she was being held hostage. He wanted to “marry” her. She rejected him.

“You’ll regret this,” the fighter told her.

A few days later, she was brought before a Boko Haram leader. He told her she would be going to the happiest place she could imagine. Hadiza thought she was going home. He was talking about heaven.

They came for her at night, she said, grabbing a suicide belt and attaching it to her waist. The fighters then sent her and the 12-year-old girl out on foot, alone, telling them to detonate the bombs at a camp for Nigerian civilians who have fled the violence Boko Haram has inflicted on the region.
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Boko Haram attack leaves 13 dead, dozens hurt in Nigeria

At least 13 people are dead after Boko Haram launched the deadliest attack in months on the northeast Nigeria city that is the birthplace of the extremist group, police said on Thursday.

The attack came just hours before a visit by the country's acting president.

Nigeria late last year declared that Boko Haram had been crushed but attacks continue, often with young women strapped into explosives for suicide attacks.

The jihadists attacked late Wednesday in Maiduguri, the capital of Borno state, as evening prayers were ending, targeting four locations around the city. Thirteen people were killed, including four attackers, Police Commissioner Damian Chukwu said.

Extremists also clashed with soldiers outside the city in Alidawari village and Jiddari Polo suburb, where homes were set on fire, Chukwu said. Nigerian forces killed three Boko Haram insurgents in that fighting, he said, and one attacker was captured alive.

Acting president Yemi Osinbajo arrived in Maiduguri on Thursday to launch a food relief program for hundreds of thousands of people who have fled their homes in the wake of Boko Haram attacks in the region. The eight-year insurgency has killed more than 20,000, kidnapped thousands and spilt into neighbouring countries, creating a vast humanitarian crisis with thousands said to be near starvation.

The attacks late yesterday in Maiduguri took place in various locations around the Chad Basin Development Authority headquarters just before 9 pm, resident Alhaji Bashir said. The targets included a mosque, he said.

Young members of a civilian defense group, who have come together to combat the Islamic extremists, saw one suicide bomber at the headquarters. "One of the youth vigilantes rushed to hold him, and the bomb went off and killed the suicide bomber and three other persons," Bashir said.

In another attack, a female suicide bomber entered a crowd of worshippers leaving prayers and detonated her explosives, he said.

Dozens of injured people filled the University of Maiduguri Teaching Hospital on Thursday, said Abba Shehu, a private security worker.

"It is a horrible sight we have here," he said. "I could not count the number of injured casualties at the accident and emergency ward, most of them sitting on the floor as the place is crowded and no beds to properly admit them.
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