News / Nigeria

About 160 more hostages rescued from Boko Haram stronghold: Nigerian army

Thursday, 30 April 2015 10:03 AM [ Last Update: Thursday, 30 April 2015 10:31 AM ]

This photo taken in Abuja, Nigeria on April 14, 2015 shows a former hostage, an escaped Chibok schoogirl (C), who is marching along with civil society groups to press for the release of schoolgirls abducted by Boko Haram terrorist group.

Government troops in Nigeria have rescued about 160 more hostages from Boko Haram's Sambisa Forest stronghold in northeast Nigeria.

Sani Usman, a Nigerian army spokesman, announced on Thursday, "We are still trying to compute the actual number of those rescued. But tentatively there are about 60 women of various ages and around 100 children."

Usman said one woman who had been taken hostage by Boko Haram died in the fighting and eight of the rescued hostages were injured.

One trooper was also killed and four others were wounded in the attack.

On Tuesday, the Nigerian army rescued around 300 women and girls kidnapped by the militant group and held in their forest bastion in Nigeria’s northeastern Borno State.

"Troops have this afternoon captured and destroyed three camps of terrorists inside the Sambisa Forest and rescued 200 girls and 93 women," military spokesman Chris Olukolade said on Tuesday.

It has not been verified if those rescued are the same “Chibok girls” who were kidnapped last year, he said adding, “The freed persons are now being screened and profiled."

Amnesty International says at least 2,000 women and girls have been kidnapped by Takfiri Boko Haram militants in Nigeria since the beginning of 2014, and many of them have been forced into sexual slavery or combat.

A screengrab taken on May 12, 2014 from a video released by the Nigerian Takfiri terrorist group Boko Haram, showing girls abducted from the northeastern town of Chibok. © AFP

On April 14, 2014, Boko Haram militants abducted 276 girls from a secondary school in Chibok in Borno State.

Fifty-seven of the girls managed to escape but 219 remained in captivity, reportedly in the Sambisa Forest.

Boko Haram's leader, Abubakar Shekau, said he would "marry them off" or sell them as "slaves."

The Takfiri militant group says its goal is to overthrow the government of Nigeria, and has claimed responsibility for a number of deadly shooting attacks and bombings in various parts of the country since the beginning of their militancy in 2009.

Over 13,000 people have died ever since and some 1.5 million have been forced from their homes.

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