This
handout picture released by the Nigerian army on April 30, 2015 and
taken this week in an undisclosed location in the Sambisa Forest, Borno
state, purportedly shows a member of the Nigerian Army standing next to a
group of women and children rescued in an operation against the
Islamist group Boko Haram. Boko Haram hostages were held in atrocious
conditions in the group’s Sambisa Forest stronghold, Nigeria’s military
said on April 30 after nearly 500 women and girls were released this
week. AFP PHOTO /
….Taken delivery of 16,000 pregnancies
By Sola Ogundipe, Chioma Obinna & Gabriel Olawale
FOLLOWING—THE latest rescue of
additional 234 women and children by the Nigerian Army from the Sambisa
Forest in Borno State, indicated, yesterday, that a sizeable number of
the rescued girls were visibly pregnant, even as unofficial reports put
the latest number of pregnant girls in one of the camps in Borno as at
last Saturday at 214.
Giving this indication in Lagos, Executive Director, UNFPA, Prof.
Babatunde Osotimehin, also disclosed that in the last one year, the
organization had taken deliveries of over 16,000 pregnancies in the
troubled North East part of the country.
Osotimehin, while giving update of the response to the rehabilitation
of the rescued women and children, said the organization, in
anticipation of the magnitude of the problem on hand, had put in place a
formidable team in collaboration with the Federal and state
governments, to first restore the dignity of the girls, who, he said,
are facing severe psychosocial trauma.
