Nigeria is a victim again as 5 of her citizens are said to be part of the 35 who were captured by ISIS in Libya –
They
have now been freed by Libyan forces – There liberation came in
December 2016, but after that, they were made to face another detention
in Misrata Twenty-eight Eritreans and seven Nigerians who were captured
and enslaved by Islamic State in Sirte and had been held in detention
since the jihadist group lost the city in December, have now been
released by Libyan authorities.
According
to reliable sources, we gathered that the Nigerians include 5 women and
two children. The women were turned in s*x slaves for months. The
Nigerians, including two children and 28 Eritreans were recovered by
Libyan forces last December and then made to face another spell of
detention in a Misrata prison. Reuters reports that the group escaped
from Sirte, a former Islamic State stronghold in central Libya, while
forces from the nearby city of Misrata battled to oust the militants
late last year.
On
their escape from Sirte, they were investigated for possible ties to
the group and held for several months in a Misrata prison. Reuters has
documented how Islamic State used enslaved refugee women to reward its
fighters in Libya. In stories published last year, the women recounted
how the group forced them to convert to Islam and sold them as s*x
slaves. In November, a Reuters reporter visited some of the captives at a
military post in Misrata. Their new captors, the women said then,
starved and humiliated them. At least one woman, a 16-year-old, was
pregnant and in need of urgent care. The Libyan attorney-general’s
office announced that it had cleared the women of any wrongdoing in
mid-February, but their release was delayed for several more weeks, with
no explanation. On Wednesday,
they were received by staff from the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) and the
Libyan Red Crescent, before being taken to a shelter for medical checks.
“I’m very happy, I can’t describe how I feel, but I am very happy, I
can start a new life and see my family again,” One 14-year-old Eritrean
girl told Reuters before leaving the prison with the rest of the group
on a Red Crescent bus. A UNHCR official said the entire group had
scabies, but otherwise appeared to be in reasonable physical condition.
The agency expects to resettle the Eritreans as refugees. “We will send
them to a safe house where they can be treated if they need medical
treatment, and receive assistance from us, and be protected,” said Samer
Haddadin, head of the UNHCR’s Libya mission. “At the same time we will
be processing them for refugee status determination … and we are doing
this to make sure we can find a resettlement country for those who meet
the resettlement criteria.” The Nigerians, five women and two children,
will be able to apply for asylum or be offered repatriation. Dozens of
women and children who escaped from Sirte or were picked up there by
Libyan forces are still being held in Misrata. They include Libyans,
Tunisians, and nationals from several sub-Saharan African countries. A
group of Filipino nurses were freed in February. Islamic State took
control of Sirte in early 2015, turning the coastal city into its most
important base outside Syria and Iraq and stationing hundreds of foreign
fighters there. It took Misrata-led forces almost seven months to
recapture the city.