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UN Delegation Views Boko Haram Effects in Lake Chad Basin

by Margaret Besheer

   N'DJAMENA, CHAD --

   A delegation of U.N. Security Council ambassadors are on a four-country
   mission to the Lake Chad Basin to draw attention to the humanitarian
   crisis caused by the Boko Haram insurgency on the region's population.

   The diplomats began their mission Friday in Yaounde, Cameroon, with
   Prime Minister Philemon Yang, who told them his country was struggling
   to cope with the 85,000 refugees it hosts from Nigeria and the more
   than 150,000 who have fled sectarian violence in the neighboring
   Central African Republic.

   Cameroon has also seen nearly 200,000 of its own citizens displaced by
   Boko Haram as the terrorists spread into isolated and insecure areas in
   the Far North Region along the Nigerian border.

   The Lake Chad Basin, which encompasses parts of Nigeria, Chad, Cameroon
   and Niger, has also been affected by poor governance and climate
   change.

   FILE - This view shows one of the biggest camps for people displaced by
   Islamist extremists in Maiduguri, Nigeria, Aug. 28, 2016. The U.N.
   Security Council on March 3, 2017, kicked off a visit to spotlight
   Africa's worst humanitarian crisis as millions face hunger amid the
   Boko Haram insurgency in Nigeria and the Lake Chad region.

   Yang said the war against Boko Haram had come at a high cost to
   Cameroon.

   "We are asking that the international community give us support, that
   the international community support our programs, support us
   financially and especially support us eventually for economic
   development in the region," he said.

   Inattention to region

   Francois Delattre, France's permanent representative to the U.N., told
   the French news agency AFP that the international community had long
   ignored the Lake Chad region.

   "This mistake, which is also an injustice, is now being rectified by
   the U.N. Security Council's visit to the region," Delattre told
   Cameroon's state-owned television channel CRTV after meeting President
   Paul Biya, AFP reported.

   After the Yaounde visit, the council ventured 90 minutes north by plane
   to Maroua, to meet with civil society group members, displaced persons,
   refugees and humanitarians to discuss the situation.

   "We came in order to show this will no longer be a neglected crisis,"
   British Ambassador Matthew Rycroft said. He added the diplomats had
   come to shine a spotlight on the growing humanitarian crisis.

   FILE - Chadian women walk past destroyed homes, in the Lake Chad shore
   village of N'Gouboua, March 5, 2015, following a scorched-earth attack
   by Boko Haram militants.

   The delegation continued to N'Djamena, Chad, which is also struggling
   with chronic poverty and the effects of about 400,000 displaced persons
   from the region.

   Chad is one of the least developed countries in the world, and the
   humanitarian crisis is pushing it to the brink. More than 4 million
   people -- nearly a third of the population -- are food insecure.

   The ambassadors were to meet Saturday with the command of the
   Multinational Joint Task Force a military force made up of troops from
   Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Benin, all of whom are fighting Boko
   Haram. The diplomats will then continue to Niger and Nigeria.