Former Field Commander of Operation Safe Haven, OPSH, Maj. Gen. Anthony Atolagbe, rtd, says bandits kidnap people to use them as human shields from the military.
General Atolagbe made this revelation on Tuesday when he featured in an interview on Arise Televisionās āPrime Timeā.
He was speaking about the rising insecurity confronting the country.
āThe bandits have a pattern of taking people into their enclave, just to use them as sex slaves, but also as shields for negotiation.
āWhat I can say also is that I will not be able to dwell on specifics. But in Sambisa, some abducted people were freed. In fact, the first thing that happened was that over 100 of them escaped, based on the heat that was brought on the adversary.
āNow, what is playing out is that these guys are being dislodged, and when they are dislodged, and they lose contact with all these women and these men that are running, who are sex slaves and liberals for them within the theater or wherever they are in their enclaves, what happens is that they try to move to other locations where they think they will be safe.
āAnd the next thing is to start looking for who they can also grab and bring into their new locations.
āThe other side is that it is also another strategy by those that are expecting the arrival of the military that are coming into their enclaves to come and chase them out by using some of these people as human shields when the military approach their location.
āSo you see that the analysis has brought it out that they have a pattern that they always want to take people into their enclave, not just to use them as slaves or whatever, but they will also want to use them to negotiate,ā the retired military officer said.
Ex-military chief gives reasons bandits kidnap people
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