BOKO HARAM: Who are they? How do they operate? How can they be contained?
Introduction Al Qaeda’s spectacular success in the 11 September, 2001 terrorist attacks in the USA emboldened Mohamed Yusuf, a Nigerian radical cleric to create his own terrorist movement which is more commonly known by the name “Boko Haram”. Its members find the latter name, which is a combination of Hausa (Boko to mean western education) and Arabic (Haram to mean “sin” or “is forbidden”) [1] , pejorative and will prefer to be called “Jama‐’at ahl al‐sunna li’l‐da’wa wa’l‐jihad” (Group of the People of Sunnah for Preaching and Jihad). Mohamed Yusuf, who died in a Nigerian prison in 2009, and his followers practice the Sunni branch of Islam, but since his death and replacement by Abubakar Shekau [2] , the movement has grown radical and now kills even Muslims in its bid to achieve its aims at all costs, aims which include the creation of an Islamic caliphate around its operating base in the North East of Nigeria. They have so far proven to be ready to stop at nothing, including i...