ABOUT 200 young boys graduated from the Darul-Quran training camp operated by the Islamic State’s West Africa Province (ISWAP) in February, according to a report by the Institute of Security Studies (ISS)
This report titled ‘Children on the battlefield: ISWAP’s latest recruits’ was published on the website of the ISS on Thursday.
The ISS reported that those familiar with the programme disclosed that ISWAP operates 50 such camps in the Lake Chad Basin where children from Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad and Niger were trained.
“Institute for Security Studies (ISS) research shows that about 200 young boys graduated from Darul Quran in early February.
“In the ISWAP video, instructors noted that the group had similar training camps in different locations. The report states that those familiar with the programme told the ISS about 50 such camps on the Lake Chad islands, where youth from Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Nigeria were present,” the report stated.
ISS further said that formal education had been one of Boko Haram’s primary targets, with 5,000 classrooms razed in northeast Nigeria since the insurgency commenced in 2009.
