ICRC tracing 17,000 cases in Nigeria — Premium Times Nigeria
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) is actively tracing approximately 17,000 cases of missing persons in Nigeria. Many of them are linked to years of conflict and population displacement.
ICRC representative in Nigeria Aliyu Dawobe said this during a two-day humanitarian journalism training session in Lagos, Premium Times Nigeria reports. Together with the Nigerian Red Cross Society, the organization is searching for people separated from their families by armed conflicts and other situations of violence.
Why the number of active cases has decreased
Previously, the ICRC register contained about 24,000 cases. Dawobe stressed that the reduction in the number of active cases by approximately 7,000 does not mean that all these people have been found or reunited with their families.
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Some cases are no longer classified as active because the ICRC has lost contact with the relatives who reported the disappearances. According to the organization, some families have moved, returned to their communities, changed phone numbers, or ended up in areas where maintaining contact is difficult.
Families separated for years
According to Dawobe, many people have had no contact with their loved ones for more than 10 years. The prolonged conflict in northeastern Nigeria has displaced millions of people and separated families in Borno, Adamawa and Yobe states.
ICRC communications coordinator Natalie Bekdash urged journalists to choose their wording carefully when covering armed conflicts and humanitarian crises. She noted that the media should pay more attention to people affected by violence rather than focusing only on attacks, casualty figures and the activities of armed groups.
