“They Didn’t Know if I Was Alive or Dead”: Military detention of children for suspected Boko Haram involvement in northeast Nigeria

The Nigerian military has been found to arbitrarily detain thousands of children for suspected involvement with the armed Islamist group Boko Haram. Many children are held without charge for months or years and often with little or no evidence of involvement with the group. These children are held in degrading and inhuman conditions, living in squalid and severely overcrowded military barracks, where they experience beatings, hunger, and overwhelming heat.

In this report, Human Rights Watch reveals the ordeals children suffer at the hands of Boko Haram and the Nigerian military. It talks about the impacts these experiences have on children’s future and provides recommendations on how the Nigerian government and other relevant stakeholders can tackle this issue.