Eighty-two Chibok schoolgirls seized
three years ago by book haram have been freed in exchange for detained suspects
with the extremist group, Nigeria’s government announced early on Sunday, in
the largest release negotiated yet in the battle to save nearly 300 girls whose
mass abduction exposed the mounting threat posed by the Islamic State-linked
fighters.
The
statement from the office of President Muhammadu Buhari was the first confirmation that his
government had made a swap for the girls. After an initial release of 21 Chibok
girls in October, the government denied making an exchange or paying ransom.
The April 2014 abduction by Boko
Haram brought the extremist group’s rampage in northern Nigeria
to world attention and, for families of the schoolgirls, began years marked
with heartbreak.
Some relatives did not live long
enough to see their daughters released. Many of the captive girls, most of them
Christians, were forced to marry their captors and give birth to children in
remote forest hideouts without ever knowing if they would see their parents
again. It is feared that other girls were strapped with explosives and sent on
missions as suicide bombers.
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