SW News: According to a Reuters investigation, the Nigerian Army slaughtered thousands of children in its fight against Islamist rebels. Over 40 soldiers and civilians told Reuters that they had either seen children killed by the Nigerian military or seen their bodies after military action.

Six cases involving at least 60 fatalities were looked into by Reuters. The investigation revealed that the Nigerian Army and allied security forces killed children throughout their arduous 13-year campaign against Islamist insurgents in the nation's northeast.

Reuters was informed by soldiers and armed guards working for the government that army superiors had instructed them to "delete" children because they were thought to be assisting Boko Haram or its Islamic State spinoff rebels. According to witnesses, there have been intentional deaths of children throughout the region during the battle.

Over 40 sources claimed to have witnessed either the Nigerian military killing children on purpose or the bodies of children after a military operation. Parents and other civilian witnesses were among these sources, as well as soldiers who claimed to have taken part in a large number of military operations involving the massacre of children.

In the six army-led operations, the majority of the children were shot, some in the back while running. Witnesses also provided concrete examples of Nigerian soldiers poisoning and suffocating kids.

However, the military denied the allegation. The army has never killed a child, according to Nigerian military leaders who spoke to Reuters. They said that this article's reporting is offensive to Nigerians and is an attempt by a foreign power to undermine the nation's war on the insurgency.

In a statement, Major General Jimmy Akpor described the Reuters reporting of child killings as "concocted claims." He claimed that Nigerian military members are "raised, bred, and further trained to safeguard life, even at their danger, especially when it involves the lives of children, women, and the old."

According to the United Nations and other humanitarian organizations, children in the northeast have frequently been caught up in wartime violence and have suffered disproportionately from its aftereffects, including displacement, wrongful incarceration, starvation, and sickness.

More than 1,200 men and boys detained during the battle were reportedly summarily executed by the Nigerian military and its allies, according to a 2015 investigation by Amnesty International. In the end, the Nigerian government decided not to look into Amnesty's allegations of extrajudicial murders and other war crimes because there was insufficient proof of any wrongdoing on the part of its personnel.

According to the Reuters investigation, Nigerian soldiers shot at children of various ages in war zones around the northeast because they believed the kids were or would turn out to be terrorists. Soldiers said they understood, and sometimes were expressly warned, that children's lives were not to be spared when commanders ordered towns to be swept of presumed rebels.

Because rebels exploited kids as combatants, informants, and suicide bombers, some soldiers claimed they had developed a kill-or-be-killed mentality against children. According to UNICEF, "non-state armed groups" in Nigeria have allegedly enlisted hundreds of youngsters, some of whom have been used as "human bombs." It stated that Boko Haram was responsible for some of the incidents in which bombs were constructed for youngsters to carry.

According to Reuters, the military frequently kept the targeted killings of youngsters a secret and covered them up. The killings typically happened in and around little, isolated settlements with poor access to other towns. According to a variety of sources, including soldiers and locals, witnesses and families were intimidated into silence, and bodies were buried or burned.

As it signed the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC) in 2002, Nigeria is subject to the ICC's jurisdiction. Although it is preferred that local courts hold participants legally responsible, the ICC may intervene if a nation is unwilling or unable to do so.