WASHINGTON, Oct. 14 (UPI) — The United States has deployed 90 of an estimated 300 soldiers to Cameroon to aid in the fight against the Boko Haram militant Islamist group.
U.S. President Barack Obama sent a letter to outgoing Speaker of the House John Boehner to inform Congress of the decision Wednesday, in accordance to the War Powers Resolution request.
“This deployment is in advance of the deployment of additional U.S. armed forces personnel to Cameroon to conduct airborne intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance operations in the region,” Obama wrote in the letter. “These forces are equipped with weapons for the purpose of providing their own force protection and security, and they will remain in Cameroon until their support is no longer needed.”
Cameroon formed a 8,700-strong coalition with Benin, Chad, Nigeria and Niger to fight Boko Haram, which pledged allegiance to the Islamic State in March.
Since 2009, Boko Haram has waged a campaign of mass kidnappings, executions, suicide bombings and assaults on remote military bases and villages, killing thousands of Nigerians.
While the group has lost most of its strongholds, it has over the summer been blamed for a series of suicide bombings in crowded markets, mainly in northeastern Nigeria but also in neighboring countries such as Chad, Niger and Cameroon.
The U.S. Department of State said the number of terrorist attacks and people killed by terrorists worldwide spiked by 81 percent in 2014, largely due to attacks by Islamic State and Boko Haram militants.
About 800,000 children have been forced to flee their homes due to violence generated by Boko Haram’s violent insurgency in Nigeria, the United Nations said.
Boko Haram was designated a foreign terrorist organization by the State Department in 2013. The militant Islamic group seeks to establish an Islamic state in Nigeria and has ruthlessly targeted civilians.
