Insurgency: FG Confirms negotiating with Boko Haram

Federal government has confirmed that it has established a contact with the dreaded insurgent group Boko Haram as discussions were ongoing to ensure a cease fire between Nigerian Forces and the insurgents.
 

At a press briefing at National Information Centre during the weekend, Mike Omeri, the coordinator of the centre said the discussions “are essentially in relation to the general insecurity in the North East and also the need to rescue all captives of the terrorists, including the students of Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok.
 

Boko Haram has sacked several communities in north east Nigeria and has killed more than 13,000 deaths in a five-year long bloody campaign.
 

The Nigerian government and the extremist Boko Haram sect have begun fresh negotiation over the release ofthe more than 200 girlsabducted by the sect fromtheir school dormitories in Chibok, Borno state, six months ago.
 

The Voice of America had quoted an unnamed adviser to President Goodluck Jonathan and Danladi Ahmadu, a man calling himself the secretary general of Boko Haram, as saying that the talks were going on in Saudi Arabia, “aided by high level officials from Chad and Cameroon”.
 

Mr. Ahmadu, reportedly said the girls are “in good condition and unharmed.”He would however “not elaborate on the conditions under which the girls would be freed. The Saudi Arabian government is not involved in the negotiations, the VOA said.
 

Omeri said Boko Haram had indicated their desire for and willingness to resolve all associated issues with their struggles adding that the government had been assured by the sect that the Chibok Secondary School girls in the captivity are all alive and well.
 

“Already, the terrorists have announced a cease fire in furtherance of their desire for peace. in this regard, the government of Nigeria has in similar vein, declared a cease fire. He said
 

“Finally, this is to assure Nigerians that the greater goal of this process is to ensure the return of normalcy in the land, especially in parts of the country troubled by the activities of terrorists. He submitted.