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Yaounde — The multinational forces fighting the Islamic extremists of Boko Haram have arrested five of the group’s leaders and freed dozens of captive women and children, Cameroon’s government announced on Saturday. The raids targeting Boko Haram bases in the northern Madawaya forest earlier this month freed 28 children and at least 18 women, government spokesperson Issa Tchiroma said.
Boko Haram had set up camp in the forest after fleeing another military operation in neighbouring Nigeria and had been training captive young girls and women as suicide bombers, he said.
The news came as French President Francois Hollande joined several West African leaders at a summit in Abuja, the Nigerian capital, where they discussed progress in the fight against Boko Haram and how to resolve the humanitarian crisis it has created. The extremist group has forced more than two million people to flee their homes, some across borders.
“We’ve to make sure they can get back to their homes,” Hollande said after meeting with Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari before the summit, noting the need for “the right development policies.” Marginalisation and corruption has allowed the Islamic extremists to flourish in northeast Nigeria.
Both leaders stressed the success of a multinational force of Nigeria and its neighbours — helped by training, intelligence and information-sharing by France, Britain and the United States — that has recaptured territory where Boko Haram had declared an Islamic caliphate. British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond was at the summit along with US Deputy Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
“Now our main problem is the rehabilitation of infrastructure destroyed — educational, health, bridges blown, etc,” Buhari said. But many refugees say they will not return home until it is safe and there are doubts Nigeria’s military can secure the vast rural areas where Boko Haram now roams.
The extremists have turned to using suicide bombers, often women and girls, to hit soft targets like mosques and marketplaces. The nearly seven-year insurgency, which has spread beyond Nigeria’s borders, has killed at least 20,000 people, according to Amnesty International.
Meanwhile, as regional and Western powers gathered in Nigeria to discuss their war with Boko Haram, the United Nations said the group posed a major threat to security in West Africa. The leaders were expected to sign “new agreements on further defence” as part of a regional security summit in Nigeria’s capital, Abuja, Femi Adesina, media advisor to Buhari, said.
The UN Security Council on Friday said the talks should help develop “a comprehensive strategy to address the governance, security, development, socio-economic and humanitarian dimensions of the crisis”. Martin Ewi, an analyst at the Institute for Security Studies, said that the group is particularly difficult to tackle in more remote areas far from major cities.
“I believe Buhari is acknowledging the difficulty and that it’s not easy for the military to just go out there and eliminate Boko Haram,” he said.
“The rural areas have always been neglected when it comes to security and that has always been the problem – the ungoverned places. In many of these regions, the police are only getting to know them now. Now it’s coming back to haunt us.”
Boko Haram’s leader, Abubakar Shekau, pledged allegiance to his ISIL counterpart Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi last year, although there has since been little evidence so far of direct support on the ground.
Hollande, who arrived in Abuja late on Friday from the Central African Republic, met his Nigerian counterpart Buhari at the presidential villa before the start of the summit.
Both countries recently signed an agreement on closer military cooperation, including intelligence sharing, and France is keen to help implement a regional solution to the conflict, given its close ties to some of its former colonies in the region.
The summit – two years after a first such high-level gathering in Paris – comes as Nigeria’s military pushes deep into Boko Haram’s Sambisa Forest stronghold after recapturing swathes of territory.
Former military ruler Buhari has vowed to defeat Boko Haram before the end of his first year in office. Al Jazeera’s Yvonne Ndege reporting from Abuja said Boko Haram violence has been declining since Buhari came to power.
“There has been a significant reduction in the violence and chaos caused by Boko Haram since Muhammadu Buhari came to power about a year ago. But obviously questionable to what extent he can take credit for that. “The Military says they had been working hard since 2009,” Ndege said.
“The focus of this summit is what more can be done to ensure Boko Haram’s capabilities are reduced,” Ndege added. – Al Jazeera
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