The mother of one of the Chibok girls kidnapped more than two years ago by Boko Haram on Sunday saw the first proof her daughter is alive — video footage of her begging the Nigerian government to exchange detained militants for the girls’ freedom.
Chibok community leader Pogu Bitrus told reporters the video was being watched at the weekly rally of the Bring Back Our Girls campaign at Unity Fountain in Abuja.
Some of the abducted Chibok schoolgirls have been killed by Nigerian military airstrikes, according to a new video from Boko Haram, which shows one kidnap victim pleading for authorities to bow to the extremists’ demands that they release detained militants in return for the girls.
Photo: AP
It is not clear how many schoolgirls have died among the 218 who remain missing.
The video footage posted on Sunday on Twitter shows a young woman, covered in a hijab with just her face showing, who was one of the students abducted from a remote school in northeastern Nigeria in April 2014.
She says that some of her kidnapped classmates died in aerial bombardments by the Nigerian Air Force, adding that 40 have been “married” to fighters.
Photo: AP
The footage shows a militant warning in the Hausa language that if Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari’s government battles Boko Haram with firepower, the girls will not be seen again.
“Presently, some of the girls are crippled, some are terribly sick and some of them, as I had said, died during bombardment by the Nigerian military,’’ the fighter says, appearing before a group of more than 40 young women in hijabs, some holding babies.
“If our members in detention are not freed, let the government and parents of the Chibok girls know that they will never find these girls again,” he said.
The video, cited by the SITE Intelligence Group, was posted by Ahmad Salkida, a Nigerian journalist known to have good contacts in Boko Haram.
Salkida said he was given the footage by associates of Abubakar Shekau, who is in a leadership battle with a lieutenant named by the Islamic State group as the new leader of what it calls its West Africa Province.
The government came under increased pressure from parents and Bring Back Our Girls campaigners after the May escape of one young woman, a proof of life that they said should encourage the military and government to redouble rescue efforts. Sunday’s video footage is another proof of life.
“The girl in the video spoke in the Chibok language and identified her mother by name. Her mother has now seen the video and identified her daughter,” Chibok leader Pogu Bitrus told reporters.
The young woman in the video, probably speaking under duress, begs for help.
“Oh you, my people and our parents, you just have to please come to our rescue: We are suffering here, the aircraft have come to bombard us and killed many of us,” she said.
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