The Nigeria Army has debunked reports by Reuters news agency that it was involved in systematic abortions of pregnancies procreated by insurgents and bandits. The Director, Defence Information, Major General Jimmy Akpor said in a statement that Reuters, is trying to malign the Nigerian Military through Mercenary journalism. General Akpor explained that the Reuters report was to allege that since 2013, Nigeria’s military had run a secret, systematic and illegal abortion programme in the North East terminating at least 12,000 pregnancies among women and girls. According to Reuters, their sources alleged that many children were shot, poisoned, suffocated or run down by vehicles in army-led actions. The statement says the report was to allege that soldiers selected babies and toddlers for killing after rescuing them and their mothers from Islamist militants, amongst other weighty allegations.
General Akpor condemned the allegations maintaining that the Nigerian military has never and would never target children during its counterinsurgency operations or other operations, both within and outside Nigeria. He said the fictitious series of stories constitute a body of insults on the Nigerian peoples and culture, as no people or culture in Nigeria practice such evil as allegedly concocted by the Reuters team. General Akpor stressed that there have been no cases of infanticide anywhere the Nigeria military has operated such as in Congo, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Rwanda, Yugoslavia – Darfur, Sudan, Gambia and Guinea Bissau amongst others. General Akpor explained that from July 2021 till November 2022, a total of 82,064 Boko Haram fighters with members of their families have surrendered to troops of Operation HADIN KAI and Out of the number, 16,553 were active male fighters, 24,446 were women while 41,065 were children who are still with their parents in the various rehabilitation centers.
