The United Nations has said that the Federal Government paid a huge ransom to Boko Haram for the release of the abducted Dapchi schoolgirls in March 2018.
\nThe government had denied reports that it paid millions of Euros for the release of the girls, noting that the hostages were released in exchange for detained Boko Haram commanders.
\nBut the UN report stated that ransom from abductions, donations from charity groups and the cash economy were fueling the bloody activities of the Boko Haram and other terrorist groups in the Lake Chad Basin region.
\nThese were contained in the 22nd Report of the Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team, pursuant to resolution 2368 (2017) concerning Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant and associated individuals and entities.
\nThe report said the number of doctrinally based non-governmental organisations sending funds to local terrorist groups was growing, and member States were concerned that radicalisation was increasing the threat level in the Sahel.
\nThe report recently submitted to the UN Security Council on Boko Haram and related terrorist organisations, said such ransom and the predominance of cash economy was providing oxygen for the insurgency around the Lake Chad region.
\nThe UN report is titled \u201c22nd Report of the Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team\u201d, related to Resolution 2368 (2017) regarding \u201cIslamic State in Iraq and the Levant \u2013 ISIL \u2013 (Da\u2019esh), Al-Qaida and associated individuals and entities.\u201d
\n\u201cIn Nigeria, 111 schoolgirls from the town of Dapchi were kidnapped on 18 February 2018 and released by ISWAP on 21 March 2018 in exchange for a large ransom payment,\u201d the report stated.
\nThe UN report negating the Nigerian government\u2019s stance reflects the manner of propaganda the Nigerian government and its military have been using to fight the war against Boko Haram.
\nOur source reported how the Nigerian military has repeatedly lied about military casualty in the war and, along with the government, claimed the Boko Haram sect was already defeated.
\nThe government\u2019s stance appears to be that suppressing information, or as in this case lying about it, would reduce the efficacy of the insurgents and thus limit their ability to carry out their terrorist acts.
\nThe Dapchi girl\u2019s ransom would not be the first by the Nigerian government to free victims held by Boko Haram. Huge ransom was also paid by the Buhari administration to free many of released Chibok girls kidnapped in 2014, senators including the leader of ruling party in the Senate, Ahmed Lawan, said. Although the move is largely welcomed by many Nigerians as it ensures freedom for the victims, experts fear it has helped fuel the insurgency by ensuring the Boko Haram has access to funds to buy more weapons and sustain themselves; a stance shared in the UN report.
\n\u201cThe predominance in the region of the cash economy, without controls, is conducive to terrorist groups funded by extortion, charitable donations, smuggling, remittances and kidnapping.\u201d
\nIt added, \u201cIn Nigeria, 111 schoolgirls from the town of Dapchi were kidnapped on 18 February, 2018 and released by ISWAP on 21 March in exchange for a large ransom payment.\u201d
\nThe report was signed by Edmund Fitton-Brown, Coordinator, Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team and Kairat Umarov, Chair, Security Council Committee.
\nThe UN Security Council committee on al Qaeda sanctions blacklisted and imposed sanctions on the Islamist militant group Boko Haram in 2014 after the insurgents kidnapped more than 200 Chibok schoolgirls.
\nThe designation, which came into effect after no objections were raised by the Security Council\u2019s 15 members, subjected Boko Haram to UN sanctions, including an arms embargo, asset freeze and travel ban.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The United Nations has said that the Federal Government paid a huge ransom to Boko Haram for the release of the abducted Dapchi schoolgirls in March 2018. The government had denied reports that it paid millions of Euros for the release of the girls, noting that the hostages were released in exchange for detained Boko […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":183296,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[76,26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-183294","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-front-pix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183294","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=183294"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183294\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/183296"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=183294"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=183294"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=183294"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}