Boko Haram Agrees To Free 200 Nigeria's Chibok Girls In Exchange For Sect's Prisoners

 

Boko Haram insurgents have offered to free more than 200 young women and girls kidnapped from a boarding school in the town of Chibok, Borno State, in exchange for the release of its fighters held by the government, a human rights activist has told The Associated Press (AP).

 

The activist said Boko Haram’s current offer is limited to the girls from the school in northeastern Nigeria whose mass abduction in April 2014 ignited worldwide outrage and a campaign to “Bring Back Our Girls” that stretched to the White House, US, and other capitals across the world.

 

The new initiative reopens an offer made last year to the government of former President Goodluck Jonathan to release the 219 students in exchange for 16 Boko Haram detainees, the activist said. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to reporters on this sensitive issue.

 

Fred Eno, an apolitical Nigerian who has been negotiating with Boko Haram for more than a year, told the AP that “another window of opportunity opened” in the last few days, though he could not discuss details.

 

He said the recent slew of Boko Haram bloodletting – some 350 people killed in the past nine days – is consistent with past intensifying of violence as the militants seek a stronger negotiating position.

 

Presidential adviser Femi Adesina said on Saturday that Nigeria’s government “will not be averse” to talks with Boko Haram.

 

“Most wars, however furious or vicious, often end around the negotiation table,” he had said.

 

Eno said the five-week-old administration of President Muhammadu Buhari offers “a clean slate” to bring the militants back to negotiations that had become poisoned by the different security agencies and their advice to former president Jonathan.

 

Two months of talks last year led government representatives and Eno to travel in September to a northeastern town where the prisoner exchange was to take place, only to be stymied by the Department for State Services (DSS), Nigeria’s intelligence agency, the activist said.

 

At the last minute then, the agency said it was holding only four of the militants sought by Boko Haram, the activist said.

 

It is not known how many Boko Haram suspects are detained by Nigeria’s intelligence agency, whose chief Buhari fired last week.

 

Thousands of suspects have died in custody, and some detainees wanted by Boko Haram may be among them. Amnesty International alleges that 8,000 detainees have died in military custody – some have been shot, some have died from untreated injuries due to torture, and some have died from starvation and other harsh treatment.

 

In May, about 300 women, girls and children being held captive by Boko Haram were rescued by Nigeria’s military, but none were from Chibok. It is believed that the militants view the Chibok girls as a last-resort bargaining chip.

 

In that infamous abduction, 274 mostly Christian girls preparing to write science exams were seized from the school by Islamic militants in the early hours of April 15, 2014. Dozens escaped on their own in the first few days, but 219 remain missing.

 

Some are feared killed by the captors for failing to cooperate and others may have died from snake bites and other causes. At least three were reported to have died – one from dysentery, one from malaria and one from a snake bite.

 

Boko Haram has not shown them since a May 2014 video in which its leader, Abubakar Shekau, warned: “You won’t see the girls again unless you release our brothers you have captured.”

 

In the video, nearly 100 of the girls, who have been identified by their parents, were shown wearing Islamic hijab and reciting the Qur’an. One of them said they had converted to Islam.

 

International indignation at Nigeria’s failure to rescue the girls was joined by U.S. first lady Michelle Obama. In a radio address in May 2014, she said she and President Barack Obama were “outraged and heartbroken” over the abduction.

 

There have been unconfirmed reports that some of the girls have been taken to neighboring countries, and that some have been radicalized and trained as fighters.

 

Last year, Shekau said the girls were an “old story,” and that he had married them off to his fighters.

 

Lawan Zanna, whose daughter is among the captives, said this week that 14 Chibok parents have died since the mass kidnapping, many from stress-related illnesses blamed on the ordeal.

 

Some of the Chibok girls who managed to escape have been rejected by their community and now live with family friends, tired of hearing taunts like “Boko Haram wives.”

 

The assumption that all girls and women held by the group have been raped is a difficult stigma to overcome in Nigeria’s highly religious and conservative society.

 

Shekau had threatened in 2013 to kidnap women and girls if Nigeria’s military did not release detained wives and children of Boko Haram militants. The government freed them in May of that year as a goodwill gesture ahead of failed peace talks, but the talks led to nowhere, and the militants started a mindless and bloody orgy of killings and capture of territories afterwards.

 

Security forces took back most of the territories in the run-up to this year’s general elections.