West Africa leaders vow to wage 'total war' on Boko Haram (Reuters)

[pinto]

West Africa leaders vow to wage 'total war' on Boko Haram

By John Irish and Elizabeth Pineau
Paris, Sat May 17, 2014 11:41pm EDT

(Reuters) - West African leaders on Saturday agreed to work together to wage "total war" on Boko Haram saying the Nigerian Islamist group had become a regional al Qaeda that threatened all of them.

Nigeria's neighbors Chad, Cameroon, Niger and Benin, and Western officials, met in Paris to flesh out a plan enabling them for the first time to share intelligence, coordinate action and monitor borders.

Although Boko Haram has been fighting for five years, carrying out bombings and attacks on civilians and the security forces, the kidnapping last month of more than 200 girls from a school in the northeast has focused world attention on them.

"Boko Haram is no longer a local terrorist group, it is operating clearly as an al Qaeda operation, it is an al Qaeda of West Africa," Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan told a news conference in Paris following the meeting.

"We have shown our commitment for a regional approach. Without West African countries coming together we will not be able to crush these terrorists," he said.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/05/18/us-nigerian-violence-summit-idUSBREA4G06120140518?feedType=RSS&feedName=topNews

[Cha]

1. Good Fortune to all who

are in this search for our girls.

thanks pinto

[pinto]

2. Same here. I've no clue to how it will / can be resolved safely for the young women. Yet a regional

effort seems a good move.

[Cha]

3. Oh, yeah.. it sounds like very encouraging progress..

[Shandris]

4. Either they need to check the definition of Total War, or this is bad news for the girls.

Total war, by definition, will leave them as casualties, not liberated people. If any of them are still alive, of course. But the article's reading sounds more like 'aggressive patrolling'. So maybe (hopefully?) it's just invective.