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The Nigerian military has arbitrarily detained
thousands of children in degrading and inhuman conditions for suspected
involvement with the armed Islamist group Boko Haram, Human Rights Watch said
in a report released today. Many children are held without charge for months or
years in squalid and severely overcrowded military barracks, with no contact
with the outside world.
The 50-page report, “‘They Didn’t Know if I Was
Alive or Dead’: Military Detention of Children for Suspected Boko Haram
Involvement in Northeast Nigeria,” documents how Nigerian authorities are
detaining children, often based on little or no evidence. Children described
beatings, overwhelming heat, frequent hunger, and being packed tightly in their
cells with hundreds of other detainees “like razorblades in a pack,” as one
former detainee said.
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“Children are being detained in horrific conditions
for years, with little or no evidence of involvement with Boko Haram, and
without even being taken to court,” said Jo Becker, children’s rights advocacy
director at Human Rights Watch. “Many of these children already survived
attacks by Boko Haram. The authorities’ cruel treatment adds to their suffering
and victimizes them further.”
The Nigerian government should sign and put into
effect a United Nations handover protocol to ensure the swift transfer of
children apprehended by the military to child protection authorities for
rehabilitation, family reunification, and community reintegration. Other
countries in the region, including Chad, Mali, and Niger, have already signed
such protocols.
Between January 2013 and March 2019, Nigerian armed
forces detained over 3,600 children, including 1,617 girls, for suspected
involvement with non-state armed groups, according to the UN. Many are detained
at Giwa military barracks in Maiduguri, the main military detention facility in
Borno State.
In June 2019, Human Rights Watch interviewed in
Maiduguri 32 children and youth who had been detained as children at Giwa
barracks for alleged involvement with Boko Haram. None of the children said
they were taken before a judge or appeared in court, as required by law, and
only one saw someone who he thought may have been a lawyer. None were aware of
any charges against them. One was detained when he was only 5 years old.
Nigerian authorities arrested the children during
military operations, security sweeps, screening procedures for internally
displaced people, and based on information from informants. Many of the
children said they were arrested after fleeing Boko Haram attacks on their
village or while seeking refuge at camps for internally displaced people. One
said he was arrested and detained for more than two years for allegedly selling
yams to Boko Haram members. Several girls had been abducted by Boko Haram or
forced to become Boko Haram “wives.”
Approximately one-third of the children interviewed
said security forces beat them during interrogation after their arrest or at Giwa
barracks. One girl who was forced to marry a Boko Haram member said that after
soldiers captured her, “The soldiers were beating us with their belts, calling
us names and telling us they will deal with us because we are Boko Haram
wives.” Others said they were beaten if they denied association with Boko
Haram.
Children described sharing a single cell,
approximately 10-by-10 meters, with 250 or more detainees. They said the stench
from a single open toilet was often overwhelming and that detainees sometimes
fainted from the heat. In Maiduguri, the average annual maximum temperature is
35 degrees Celsius and temperatures can exceed 40 degrees.
Nearly half of the children said they saw dead
bodies of other detainees at Giwa barracks. Many said they suffered frequent
thirst or hunger.
Fifteen of the children had been detained for more
than a year, and some had been held for more than three years. None had been
allowed to contact family members outside the detention center, nor had the
authorities contacted their families. Such cases may constitute enforced
disappearances, a serious human rights violation.
The children said that Giwa has a cell for boys
under 18 with children as young as 7, or even younger. The military also
detains children in adult cells, where children said food and water were
scarcer and conditions even more crowded. Very young children and babies are
kept with their mothers and older girls in a separate cell. Three girls said
they saw male soldiers making sexual advances toward female detainees or
removing girls from the cell for long periods for what they believed was sexual
exploitation.
The military provides no formal education or
rehabilitation activities for children at Giwa. Children reported that their
only activities were prayer, watching television, and informal lessons that
some children provided for others. The overcrowded conditions made physical
activity impossible, and some children said they developed sores from
restricted movement.
Since January 2013, Nigerian authorities have
released at least 2,200 children from detention, nearly all without charge.
According to the UN, 418 children were detained in 2018, a significant decrease
from 2017, when over 1,900 children were detained.
Following their release, some children said they
suffered social stigma from presumed involvement with Boko Haram, even if they
had no ties to the group. Nearly all said they wanted to go to school, but many
said that available schools were too far away, or that they didn’t have money
for transportation.
Nigerian authorities should immediately release
children currently in military custody. If military or intelligence authorities
have credible evidence of criminal offenses by children, they should transfer
them to civilian judicial authorities to be treated in accordance with national
and international juvenile justice standards.
“Nigeria faces formidable challenges from the Boko
Haram insurgency, but detaining thousands of children is not the answer,”
Becker said. “Children affected by the conflict need rehabilitation and
schooling, not prison.”
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