ICC Note: Boko Haram has killed more than 20,000 innocent people during their terrorist attacks. As a result, millions of civilians have been forced to flee their countries and leave everything behind to seek refuge elsewhere. The Islamic militants continue to carry out terrorist attacks and spread fear in Nigeria, Niger, Chad, Cameroon and other nearby regions. Additionally, Boko Haram has repeatedly targeted Christians simply because of their faith through massacres, church bombings, kidnappings and school shootings. Furthermore, the terrorist group takes pride in such attacks and has vowed to continue the persecution of Christians in the area.

9/14/2016, South Africa (Crux Now) – When aid worker El-hedji Gombe Abba was growing up, very little happened on the road that runs through Niger’s Diffa region into the city, but nowadays people fleeing Boko Haram violence form a seemingly endless line along it.

“This is a new and terrible way of life,” Abba told Catholic News Service in a Sept. 8 telephone interview from Diffa, the regional capital of a territory of 600,000 people situated close to Niger’s border with Nigeria.

Abba, who is in his mid-30s, works for a nongovernmental organization called Demi-E, which partners with Catholic Relief Services, the U.S. bishops’ international aid and development agency, in helping local and displaced people in the region.

Michael Stulman, CRS regional information officer for West and Central Africa, told CNS in a Sept. 7 telephone interview from Diffa that the agency has prioritized helping those affected by Boko Haram violence.

More than 20,000 people have been killed in attacks by Nigeria-based Boko Haram, and some 2.6 million people have been forced to flee their homes. The conflict that began seven years ago in Nigeria has spilled into Niger, Chad and Cameroon, all of which have joined Nigeria in fighting the Muslim militant group.

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