Defence Headquarters, on Wednesday, dissociated the military from reported negotiations by the Katsina State Government with bandits that abducted 333 students of Government Science Secondary School, Kankara, Katsina State, last Friday.
The DHQ said the military would continue its ongoing kinetic operations, noting that the armed forces were reviewing strategies to ensure the safe rescue of the children.
Coordinator, Defence Media Operations, Maj. Gen. John Enenche, stated this while giving an update on the military operations across the country, in Abuja.
The defence spokesman said it was not part of the rules of engagement of the military to negotiate with perceived criminals.
He assured that the troops would rescue the schoolboys from their abductors soon.
Enenche said, “I don’t know from history where the military or the armed forces go into negotiations when it comes to ransom and I don’t have any record. Nothing is connecting the armed forces with negotiation. If the governor believes in that as a father, he is seeing it from a larger perspective.
“We are going on with our operations, and we don’t step down our kinetic operations for any reason at all. There is nowhere in the world where you stop your kinetic operation; it is a total package because purported negotiations are going on. It is not done.”
The defence spokesman said that the military had taken all the necessary briefs from other agencies and the Katsina State Government on the condition of the abducted students.
The DHQ spokesman said from the latest available information, the hostages were still with the bandits unharmed.
Enenche said, “Nobody is dead; we have not received anything that anybody is dead from the information that we have on the situation and then, the troops are on guard as it were.
“They have started patrolling the whole of that area which I will not give you the specifics to ensure that they are intact and that we rescue them alive, whichever way.”
He dismissed the reported claim by the Boko Haram leader, Abubakar Shekau, that the school children were abducted by his group, saying that it was the usual propaganda of the terrorist group.
The defence spokesman said that the military had continued to record successes against terrorists in the North-East and bandits in the North-West with heavy casualties on the terrorists’ side in the last two weeks.