25, January 2017
Nigeria: Boko Haram using babies to thwart detection 0
Nigerian authorities have warned that female Takfiri bombers are using babies to thwart detection before their attacks. According to a new report, Nigerian officials stated that terrorist groups have been using women to carry out bombing attacks for some time but the use of babies in attacks signals a “dangerous” trend.
The report, published by the state-run BBC on Monday, called these bombings “suicide attacks,” but the fact that the innocent infants have no forethought or deliberation for killing themselves and others render the terminology null and void. On January 13, two women wearing concealed explosives managed to slip past a checkpoint in the town of Madagali and detonate their bombs, killing themselves and four other people. The assailants were able to slip past security because they were mistaken for civilians as they were carrying infants.
The main suspect for the blast is the Takfiri Boko Haram terrorist group, which is known for using women and young girls in their attacks. Boko Haram has pledged allegiance to Daesh, another Takfiri group, which has been wreaking havoc in the Middle East and North Africa over the past few years. In 2015, four women attempted to launch another attack on the town. Two were stopped at a checkpoint, but the two other, who were carrying babies, managed to pass the checkpoints and explode their explosives.
Nigeria has been at war with Boko Haram since the group started an insurgency in Borno about eight years ago. Almost 15,000 people have been killed while the violence has displaced more than two million. In recent months, army troops and civilian fighters in Nigeria have managed to foil many bomb attacks involving terrorists wearing explosive vests before the assailants were able to reach heavily-populated targets and detonate their bombs of their own accord. In response to the government’s actions, the terrorists have increased their bombing attacks.
On January 16, at least four people, including a university professor, were killed after a young girl, accompanied by a small child, detonated her explosive-laden vest at a university campus in Nigeria’s northeastern province of Borno. Meanwhile, the UN’s West African humanitarian coordinator, Toby Lanzer announced that Boko Haram’s actions in the region have put the lives of over half a million children in danger of severe malnutrition.
He stressed that if these children do not receive aid soon, they will die, adding that several communities have already lost all their infants. “If they don’t get the help they need on time, they die.” “What we have seen is extraordinary…I have seen adults sapped of all energy, who are almost unable to walk. We have had villages and towns devoid of 2- and 3- and 4-year-old children because they’ve died,” he added.
While noting that Nigeria and the Lake Chad region have been hit worst by the crisis, he stressed that there are about 11 million people there are “in desperate need” of aid while some 7.1 million more of them are “severely food-insecure.”
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27, January 2017
UN World Food Programme says millions of Nigerians at risk of dying from starvation 0
The United Nations World Food Programme has sounded the alarm for millions of people who are at risk of dying from starvation in the militant-infested northeastern region of Nigeria. The Boko Haram Takfiri terrorists are obstructing efforts to deliver food to the crisis-hit region, the WFP warned on Friday.
Ertharin Cousin, the WFP executive director, said there were areas unreachable to the UN agency. “The challenge is that there are areas in Borno state, in particular, that are still inaccessible, and we have no idea of the food security situation,” she said, adding that an estimated 4.4 million people needed food assistance in the northeast.
Even in parts of the northeast held and defended by the army, Boko Haram attacks were jeopardizing aid programs, Cousin said. Ending the insurgency will require a political as well as a military solution, said Cousin, adding, “Until we resolve those issues the humanitarian situation will not improve to a level that allows us to reach all of those in need.”
The government has told aid agencies it expects the conflict to end in six months, she said. “I am imploring the international community to continue to provide us with the support that is necessary,” said Cousin. The WFP is the world’s largest humanitarian agency fighting hunger worldwide, delivering food assistance in emergencies and working with communities to improve nutrition and build resilience.
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