PARIS, July 7. /ITAR-TASS/. Over 60 girls kidnapped in June by militants of radical Islamist group Boko Haram managed to escape from captivity, AFP news agency reported.

According to reports of law enforcement agencies from Damboa local government area of Borno State, Nogeria, 63 out of 68 kidnapped escaped on Friday afternoon and are already back in their homes in the village of Kummabza. The area’s administration said that there were children between the ages of 3-12 among the hostages.

“They took advantage of the absence of guards, who went to another armed sally,” a representative of the security service told journalists.

On the previous day, the governmental forces went into combat with the radicals after the latter attacked the city of Damboa. The military report about the elimination of 50 militants.

 

What does Boko Haram seek

Boko Haram was founded in 2002 as Salafist cult. It’s official name translates from Arabian as Congregation of the People of Tradition for Proselytism and Jihad. Boko Haram is a popular name, whih figuratively translates from Hausa language as ‘Western education is sin’.

The group seeks the establishment of Sharia rules in the north of Nigeria through regular armed attacks and acts of terrorism. For several years, its members are actually conducting a war against the authorities, attacking patriarchs and leaders of religious communities, and choosing state facilities as targets.

The most notorious act of Boko Haram was the abduction of 200 schoolgirls from a gymnasium in Chibok village in the country’s north-east in mid-April. The Islamists explained the attack on the education facility saying that “western education should be stopped, and the girls must leave school and marry”.