US says it hasn’t abandoned missing girls
The assurance was given by United States ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power in Cameroon while speaking on Boko Haram along with senior US military officials.
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The assurance was given by United States ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power in Cameroon while speaking on Boko Haram along with senior US military officials, New York Times reports.
“I want to assure the parents of the Chibok girls and the parents of any children gone missing that, indeed, the United States is in this for the long haul,” Ms Power said.
The US military officials also revealed that American and African forces sent to Cameroon to fight Boko Haram have located some of the Chibok girls several times but couldn’t rescue them for fear that the terrorists could kill other captives in retaliation.
“You’re not just looking for 200 girls. There are many, many others who have been taken hostage, and more thousands killed, and two and a half million people displaced,” former head of the US Africa Command, Gen. Carter F. Ham said, according to NY Times.
“So the challenge is, how do you find lots of people held hostage in different places? That’s really complex and it stretches the capability of local forces,” he added.
Current head of the command, Gen. David M. Rodriguez, has also said that the Chibok girls have been “moved to some very isolated places” adding that locating them is “not an exact science.”
Fresh concern about the girls’ whereabouts arose on April 14, 2014, the second anniversary of their capture.
The Nigerian government has also promised to rescue the girls but said that no exact date could be given for the operation.
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