Nigeria’s Islamic extreme terrorists, Boko Haram, has owned up to ordering the execution of television news reporter, Zakariyya Isa, alleging that he was creamed because he took advantage of his close contacts with the group to snitch on its operations.
Boko Haram’s spokesman revealed in an e-mail sent to media outlets that Mr. Isa was close to the group and that he was adequately informed that he was a target for passing sensitive information on its operations to Nigerian security agencies.
The case of the slain cameraman underscores a campaign recently started in Nigeria by Amnesty International (AI) on the need to initiate measures to protect whistle-blowers and witnesses who are willing to give information that would assist in curbing official corruption, human right violations and violent crimes in the country. How the Boko Haram group knew that the journalist who worked with the official national news house, the Nigerian Television Authority, NTA, may never be known. And his case, by national laws, if he knew about the operations of the Islamic cult without divulging information to the authorities, could make him a co-conspirator as well as being possibly charged as an accessory before or after the fact of a plot to destabilize the country: treason and felony.
Boko Haram said in an Afghanistan would support Pakistan in case of military conflict between Pakistan and the United States, Afghan President Hamid Karzai said in an interview to a private Pakistani TV channel broadcast on Saturday.
The remarks were in sharp contrast to recent tension between the two neighbors over cross-border raids, and Afghan accusations that Pakistan was involved in killing the chief Afghan peace envoy, former Afghan president Burhanuddin Rabbani, by a suicide bomber on September 20.
“God forbid, If ever there is a war between Pakistan and America, Afghanistan will side with Pakistan,” he said in the interview to Geo television.
“If Pakistan is attacked and if the people of Pakistan needs Afghanistan’s help, Afghanistan will be there with you.”
Such a situation is extremely unlikely, however. Despite months of tension and tough talk between Washington and Islamabad, the two allies appear to be working to ease tension.
In a two-day visit to Islamabad, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton issued stern warnings and asked for more cooperation in winding down the war in Afghanistan, but ruled out “boots on the ground” in North Waziristan, where Washington has been pushing Pakistan to tackle the Haqqani network.
The Haqqani are a group of militants Washington has blamed for a series of attacks in Afghanistan, using sanctuaries in the Pakistani tribal region along the Afghan border.
Pakistan is seen as a critical to the U.S. drive to end the conflict in Afghanistan.
Pressure on Islamabad has been mounting since U.S. special forces found and killed Osama bin Laden in May in a Pakistani garrison town, where he apparently had been living for years.
The secret bin Laden raid was the biggest blow to U.S.-Pakistan relations since Islamabad joined the U.S. “war on terror” after the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.
Karzai said tensions between the United States and Pakistan did not have any impact in his country’s attitude toward Pakistan.
The TV channel, Geo, did not say when the interview was conducted.
Afghans have long been suspicious of Pakistan’s intentions in their country and question its promise to help bring peace. Karzai repeated that concern in his remarks.
“Please brother, stop using all methods that hurt us and that are now hurting you.
“Let’s engage from a different platform, a platform in which the two brothers only progress toward a better future in peace and harmony,” he said.
Following the death of Rabbani, Karzai said he would cease attempting to reach out to the Afghan Taliban and instead negotiate directly with Pakistan, saying its military and intelligence services could influence the militants to make peace.
e-mail that Zakariyya “was not killed in error”. Said the spokesman of the group in the same statement, “We killed him because he was spying on us for Nigerian security authorities. The killing was carefully planned and executed.
“We have ample evidence … that he was giving vital information to security agencies on our mode of operation that led to the arrest of many of our members.
The statement, written in the Hausa language widely spoken in Nigeria’s north, said Boko Haram “killed him not because he was a journalist but for his personal misconduct.”
It added that the sect would not hesitate to “kill anybody that steps on our toes”.
The NTA manager in Maiduguri said he had “no reason to believe that (Isa) was working as a spy for the security agencies.”
“Zakariyya Isa was a dedicated and loyal staff,” said Daniya Mohammed. “He was a kind of person who could not hurt a fly. I was therefore shocked and sad when I learnt that he had been killed by some gunmen.”
Marilyn Ogar, a spokeswoman for Nigeria’s secret police, said Isa had not worked as an informant on her agency’s behalf.
Boko Haram has been blamed for scores of bomb blasts and shootings, mainly in Nigeria’s northeast. It also claimed responsibility for the August 26 bombing of UN headquarters in the capital Abuja that killed at least 24 people.
Meanwhile, a group that styles itself The Nigerian Young Journalists Forum has strongly condemn the killing of Alhaji Zakariya Isa.
The group in a statement signed by its President and General Secretary, Ayodele Samuel and Zacheaus Somorin in Lagos, yesterday described the killing as barbaric and assault on the noble profession.
“We therefore called for immediate investigation of the killing of Alhaji Isa, by the federal government, while we urge the Boko Haram sect to stop the killings of media practitioners and indeed Nigerians in the cause of their struggle”.