The Nigerian Islamist group Boko Haram has released a video showing some of the schoolgirls they abducted from the northern town of Chibok.
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“They should know that their children are still in our hands”, said a man whose face was covered by a turban in the video posted on YouTube. “A separate scene shows bodies on the ground, suggesting they were killed in aerial bombardments by Nigeria’s military”.
The mother of one of the Chibok girls kidnapped more than two years ago by Nigeria’s Islamic extremists on Sunday saw the first proof her daughter is alive – a video of the girl begging Nigeria’s government to exchange detained militants for the girls’ freedom.
And as The Associated Press reported, it’s “not clear how many schoolgirls have died among the 218 who remain missing”. He also said he recognized some of the other girls in the video.
The militant claimed that they would murder the surviving girls if the government made any attempt of rescuing them using any other method than what they have demanded.
One of the kidnapped girls was found alive in the Sambisa Forest in northeastern Nigeria in May.
Grab from the new video by Boko Haram shows the fighter and the girls surrounding him.
While the military has gained important wins in the fight against the group under Buhari, reclaiming territory and destroying Boko Harm’s strongholds, the only success that can be claimed with regard to the kidnapped girls is the rescue of one of them in May.
One veiled girl could be seen holding a baby.
“We recognise up to 10 from the video”, Abdullahi said, adding that he was waiting for confirmation from the Nigerian government and parents of the girls before releasing more names.
According to a translation by The Guardian, she says, “To our parents-please be patient.There is no kind of suffering we haven’t seen”. The case spurred an worldwide outcry and prompted the “Bring Back Our Girls” campaign. In the video, the man conducts a staged interview with one of the students, who says numerous girls have been badly injured in military air strikes.
Boko Haram has been blamed for some 20,000 deaths and displacing of more than 2.6 million people since 2009.
This latest video is among a handful that have been posted by Boko Haram online in recent days.
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Both Bolori and Wakil have also declared their readiness to appear before the army over the issue, although they pilloried the military for declaring them wanted without a prior invitation even when their addresses are known to the government.
