Punch
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has alerted Nigeria and other African countries that armed groups and terror organisations are “reaching a new level of cooperation and training”.
The agency also raised an alarm that the aim of armed groups has grown beyond making a profit, in a statement titled, “UNHCR is worried about the security situation in Africa and how it will effect Equatorial Guinea”, on Tuesday.
According to the United Nations refugee agency, the number of refugees in Africa skyrocketed in recent years due to ongoing terrorist activity-related crises in Nigeria and Sahel.
The agency also noted that 2020 witnessed the deadliest militant Islamist violence and upsurge in terrorist activity in the Sahel, West, and North Africa.
Nigeria’s North-West and central states have been caught up in a surge in violence from heavily armed bandits who loot villages, steal cattle, and carry out mass kidnappings.
The violence has its roots in years-long tensions and tit-for-tat raids between farmers and nomadic herders over grazing land and water resources.
But bandit attacks worsened since the criminal gangs emerged under Buhari’s regime. Most of them are based in vast forests across Kaduna, Katsina, Niger, and Zamfara states.
