Nigeria: Beyond Boko Haram

1 September 2011
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The bombing of the UN Office in Abuja on the last Friday of the holy month of Ramadan, is one of several spates of mayhems thought to have been carried out by Boko Haram. The group, believed to have been formed in 2002 by the late Muslim cleric Mohammed Yusuf, was initially peaceful. In June 2009 it waged a short- lived uprising which it said was aimed at establishing an Islamic State. The insurrection was brutally crushed by the military in July 2009.

Some 800 people, mostly sect members, died from that face-off. Since January 2010 surviving sect members - or people acting in their names - have claimed to be behind the series of lethal bombings across many parts of the North and Abuja. One of the jigsaw puzzles in the bombing of the UN headquarters however is why a group, which claims to be driven by puritanical religious fervour, would carry out such an act on a Friday, a holy day for Muslims. It is also not exactly clear the reasons why the group became radicalised and the sources of the increasing sophistication of its methods.

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