US concerned about tackling Boko Haram menace —State Department

The Strategic Initiatives Unit Chief, Office of the
International Religious Freedom, US State Department, Douglas
Padgett, has said the US government is committed to dealing with
the problem of Boko Haram in Nigeria.

Boko Haram is a terror group that continues to wreak havoc in
the northeastern part of Nigeria.

Padgett spoke at a briefing on “Religious Freedom and Tolerance”
with a delegation of the East-West Center’s 2019 Senior Journalists
Seminar at the US Department of State, Washington DC.

He said, “It (Boko Haram) is an old problem which hasn’t gone
away and we are concerned about dealing with it. I used to work in
the Nigerian office of the department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human
Rights and Labour and spent a lot of my time thinking about Boko
Haram in the early days of 2011 and 2012. I still do.

“Our office will continue to maintain that fair and inclusive
governance, provision of government services and a new security
approach will amount to dealing with Boko Haram and other issues of
violence within the country.”

Saying there had been a proliferation of other groups in the
region (North-East), Padgett added, “I don’t have specific stuff
for you in terms of our plans to defeat Boko Haram. But we have a
number of humanitarian and human rights programmes to deal with it.
In Nigeria, a lot of efforts is also ongoing.”

Paggett said, “The drivers of violence that created Boko Haram
are not simply religious. There were issues of human rights abuse
and how you handle them. I am not blaming the government of
Nigeria. I am saying it is a broader and complicated issue. You
have to handle a wide range of issues to deal with the
problem.”

He also stated that the US government would continue to support
efforts to check the Boko Haram menace.

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