Jan 18 at 6:15 AM Boko Haram crisis: Multi-national military action needed - Mahama. Chairman of the ECOWAS Heads of States and Governments, John Mahama, is proposing a multi-national military action against Islamist terror group, Boko Haram. “We are increasingly getting to the point where probably a regional or a multinational force is getting into consideration, but like I said, it’s what we want to discuss at the AU. If that must happen there must be a mandate that is given by the African Union that allows such a force to operate and that is why we are calling for the session on terrorism and how to deal with it at the 24th AU Summit. Thousands see off Chadian troops to fight Boko Haram. Tens of thousands of people joined a march in NDjamena on Saturday in support of Chadian troops heading to Nigeria and Cameroon to fight the Islamist group Boko Haram. Marching some five kilometres (three miles) through Chads capital, demonstrators waved the national flag and chanted in French and Arabic: Kick the forces of evil out of our territory. The event came as a huge convoy set off from NDjamena to combat the Islamists sowing terror in northeastern Nigeria and northern Cameroon. Thousands of locals hailed the arrival of some 400 vehicles in the Cameroonian border town of Kousseri, an AFP journalist reported. Early this month Boko Haram launched a full-scale assault on the strategic town of Baga on the banks of Lake Chad, which straddles the borders of Chad, Nigeria, Niger and Cameroon. Chad is part of a regional force against Boko Haram that was based in Baga -- but both Chad and Niger had withdrawn their troops before the January 3 attack. Chadian President Idriss Deby said in a speech read by the speaker of parliament that the new deployment aimed to recapture Baga. Satellite pictures released by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch last week showed around 3,700 buildings in Baga and nearby Doron Baga damaged or destroyed. Daniel Eyre, Nigeria researcher for Amnesty International, said as many as 2,000 civilians may have been massacred, but Nigerias army objected to the sensational claims and said that the death toll in Baga was about 150. Brutal raids, massacres, suicide bomb attacks and kidnappings by Boko Haram have claimed at least 13,000 lives and driven an estimated 1.5 million people from their homes, mainly in northeastern Nigeria
Posted on: Mon, 19 Jan 2015 07:12:37 +0000
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