Nigerian villagers and local leaders say militants in Boko Haram continued kidnapping children last week and into the weekend, all while negotiations continued to release the more than 200 Chibok girls abducted in the spring.
Nigerian media outlets largely relied on the account of a local leader from the town of Mafa who took office only a month ago and said attacks began Wednesday.
The newspaper Leadership said the official was visibly shaken as he told reporters, "From the information available to us, about 30 youths have been taken away and the insurgents are tormenting the communities by carrying out daily attacks."
Boko Haram is well-entrenched in the remote northeast region of the country and has plagued Nigeria for five years, most notably in April when it kidnapped hundreds of girls from a school in Chibok. (Video via The New York Times)
Monday morning Human Rights Watch issued a report on Boko Haram's kidnapping victims.
It says the group abducted more than 500 women and girls since 2009 and criticized the Nigerian government's response to stop the abductions and help the victims.
Video interviews with victims, some of whom were kidnapped from Chibok, showed the women were forced to convert to Islam, marry militants and even used on front lines of their attacks for tasks like holding bullets. (Video via Human Rights Watch)
Nigeria announced more than a week ago it had reached a cease-fire agreement with the terrorist group, which included the release of the Chibok schoolgirls. But these latest kidnappings along with reports of another mass abduction the previous weekend of at least 50 women and girls only further increases skepticism Boko Haram and the heavily criticized government will actually make the release happen. (Video via CBS, Channels TV)
In an article posted Monday morning by The Nigerian Tribune, however, government officials continued to insist the Chibok girls would be released later in the day.
