Girls and young women faced unlawful military detention after escaping the Islamic Jihadist Organization Boko Haram in the northeast of Nigeria, human rights group Amnesty International reported Monday.
The report, titled “Help us build our lives”, is based on 126 interviews with girls and young women who experienced and suffered through abuses committed by Boko Haram and the Nigerian authorities. Amnesty accused the Nigerian government of not adequately supporting the women and girls who are now trying to rebuild their lives.
Boko Haram abducted many children over the years as they attacked the civilian population in northeast Nigeria. Those who were deemed non-believers by the jihadist organization were killed, and many the abducted girls were forcibly married.
The women and girls who escaped Boko Haram would often end up detained by the Nigerian military while the others were left in displacement camps to fend for themselves. Reports state that some of the women and girls who escaped would be later on reunited with their Boko Haram husbands through a transit camp, which was run by the Nigerian government. This leads to the risk of further and continued abuse of the women, said Amnesty.
Amnesty International’s West and Central Africa Director, Samira Daoud said “These girls, many of them now young women, had their childhood stolen from them” while simultaneously suffering war crimes and human rights abuses. Even with these hardships they “seek to take control of their future.”
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