UN Security Council to visit Nigeria in March over Boko Haram

- The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has announced its plan to visit Nigeria next month over activities of Boko Haram insurgency in the North-East

- The deputy spokesperson for the UN-secretary general Farhan Haq confirmed in New York that the visit has been scheduled to place in March

The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has announced its plan to visit Nigeria next month over activities of Boko Haram insurgency in the North-East.

The deputy spokesperson for the UN-secretary general Farhan Haq confirmed in New York that the visit has been scheduled to place in March.

Haq said among issues to be discussed include strategies for fighting insurgency and to assess the level of humanitarian crisis caused by the terrorists in the North-East.

He also assured that the UN will continue to support Nigeria in ensuring that terrorism is eliminated in the region.

Haq said: "And there will be efforts to also evaluate what the situation (Boko Haram) is.

“I believe, in the coming days, the Security Council itself does intend to visit Nigeria and see for itself the humanitarian situation and evaluate it first-hand," Haq said.

“The Security Council will be going to Nigeria to assess the humanitarian situation caused by Boko Haram.

“The visit will be coming up in March,” he said.

He said the UN agencies and its partners would continue to deliver aid and provide other humanitarian assistance to the victims of the insurgency in the northeast. “We (UN and partners) do continue to try to provide humanitarian aid, including in Nigeria

“Certainly, any violence on the ground makes it more difficult to deliver humanitarian aid,” Haq said.

In May 2014, the UN Security Council listed Boko Haram as a terrorist group.

The listing was done at the request of the Nigerian government in the same year.

The forum said the leader have over time continued to support and finance the terrorist group for either political, economic or personal gains.

Naij