ABUJA – Nigeria on Friday said
that a decision to cancel US training of its soldiers to fight Boko
Haram was a logistical, not a political decision.
The US Embassy in Abuja announced on Monday that the Nigerian
government had halted a training programme of an army battalion, which
would have developed into a unit to take on the militants. The
cancellation came after Nigeria's ambassador to Washington last month
criticised the United States for the scope, nature and content of its
support for the counter-insurgency.
In particular, he said Washington had failed to provide the weapons
required to deliver a killer punch to Boko Haram. But Nigeria's national
security spokesman, Mike Omeri, played down talk of strained diplomatic
ties, saying it did not affect the countries' existing military
cooperation. “This is just a training component for one battalion of the
Nigerian Army,” he told AFP.
“We have had the first and second phase of that training, so it is
not as if the whole bilateral military agreement has been suspended. The
suspension is logistical and not political.” Omeri was quoted as saying
in the Nigerian media on Friday that the cancelled third phase required
military equipment to be withdrawn from current operations to be used
for training.
The US Embassy had said it regretted the end of the training
programme, which had been offered in the wake of Boko Haram's abduction
of 276 schoolgirls in northeast Nigeria in mid-April. A number of
foreign powers sent surveillance and intelligence specialists to Nigeria
to assist the military with the search for the 219 teenagers who are
still being held.
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