500 Boko Haram members jailed in Nigeria since February

By Adam Abu-bashal

ABUJA, Nigeria (AA) - At least 500 Boko Haram terrorists have been imprisoned in Nigeria since February, according to an official on Tuesday.

Operation Safe Corridor (OPSC) Commander Maj. Gen. Bamidele Ashafa said 1,000 Boko Haram members have been prosecuted and 500 have been jailed since February.

"The jailed are serving various jail terms for up to 60 years. The minimum term is five years. Arrangements are also being concluded to begin the trial of another set of Boko Haram suspects. That will start between now and June," Ashafa said at the National Defense and Security Summit in the capital of Abuja on behalf of Chief of Defense Staff Gen. Lucky Irabor.

OPSC is a rehabilitation center established by the government for terrorists who willingly renounced their terror acts and surrender to the state.

The government announced in February that 5,000 Boko Haram members captured in Borno state will be tried.

Boko Haram launched a bloody insurgency in 2009 in northeastern Nigeria but later spread its atrocities to neighboring Niger, Chad, and Cameroon, prompting a military response.

More than 30,000 people have been killed and nearly 3 million displaced in a decade of Boko Haram's terror activities in Nigeria, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

Violence committed by Boko Haram has affected 26 million people in the Lake Chad region and displaced 2.6 million others, according to the UN Refugee Agency.

*Writing by Jeyhun Aliyev in Ankara