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Chibok schoolgirls kidnapped by Boko Haram sect in Borno state have been
sighted by United States surveillance flights within Nigeria.
The flights sighted what appeared to be large groups of girls held together in remote locations.
The development, both U.S. and Nigerian officials said, had raised hopes that the girls were still alive and among those that Boko Haram sect abducted from Government Secondary School, Chibok, on April 14, 2014.
The surveillance suggests that at least some of the 219 schoolgirls still held captive haven’t been forced into marriages or sex slavery as had been feared, but instead are being used as bargaining chips for the release of jailed terrorists.
According to a report at the WSJ, the US intelligence matched what the Federal Government said it heard from northern Nigerians who had interacted with the Islamist insurgents that some of Boko Haram’s most famous set of captives were getting special treatment, compared with the hundreds of other girls the group was suspected to have kidnapped.
“Boko Haram appears to have seen the schoolgirls as of higher value, given the global attention paid to their plight,” the officials said.
“In early July, US surveillance flights over North-East spotted a group of 60 to 70 girls held in an open field,” two US defence officials said, adding that “late last month, they spotted a set of roughly 40 girls in a different field.”
“When surveillance flights returned, both sets of girls had been moved,” US intelligence analysts said, adding that “they don’t have enough information to confirm whether the two groups of girls they saw are the same.”
The intelligence analysts stated further that they could not say whether those groups included any of the schoolgirls the sect had held since April, but the US and Nigerian officials said they believed they were the schoolgirls.
“It’s unusual to find a large group of young women like that in an open space,” one US defence official said, adding that “we’re assuming they’re not a rock band of hippies out there camping.”
The flights sighted what appeared to be large groups of girls held together in remote locations.
The development, both U.S. and Nigerian officials said, had raised hopes that the girls were still alive and among those that Boko Haram sect abducted from Government Secondary School, Chibok, on April 14, 2014.
The surveillance suggests that at least some of the 219 schoolgirls still held captive haven’t been forced into marriages or sex slavery as had been feared, but instead are being used as bargaining chips for the release of jailed terrorists.
According to a report at the WSJ, the US intelligence matched what the Federal Government said it heard from northern Nigerians who had interacted with the Islamist insurgents that some of Boko Haram’s most famous set of captives were getting special treatment, compared with the hundreds of other girls the group was suspected to have kidnapped.
“Boko Haram appears to have seen the schoolgirls as of higher value, given the global attention paid to their plight,” the officials said.
“In early July, US surveillance flights over North-East spotted a group of 60 to 70 girls held in an open field,” two US defence officials said, adding that “late last month, they spotted a set of roughly 40 girls in a different field.”
“When surveillance flights returned, both sets of girls had been moved,” US intelligence analysts said, adding that “they don’t have enough information to confirm whether the two groups of girls they saw are the same.”
The intelligence analysts stated further that they could not say whether those groups included any of the schoolgirls the sect had held since April, but the US and Nigerian officials said they believed they were the schoolgirls.
“It’s unusual to find a large group of young women like that in an open space,” one US defence official said, adding that “we’re assuming they’re not a rock band of hippies out there camping.”