The Nigerian government has denied a report published last week about a secret programme of forced abortions run by the military in the country, Information Minister Lai Mohammed said, reported The Aljazeera.
The report claimed that the Nigerian Army had been running a secret, systematic and illegal abortion programme in the country’s northeast since at least 2013. As per the report, the programme involved terminating at least 10,000 pregnancies among women and girls, many of whom had been kidnapped and raped by Islamist militants.
The sources included 33 women and girls, five health workers, and nine security personnel involved in the alleged programme, and documentation reviewed by Reuters.
“The Federal Government hereby categorically states that there is no ‘secret, systematic and illegal abortion programme’ being run by our military in the northeast or anywhere across the country,” the minister said in opening remarks at a public event in Abuja on Monday.
He said the government also rejected the accusation of running an abortion programme levelled at the military.
Mohammed’s comments were the first by a Nigerian government official since the report was published last week.
The military has also denied carrying out abortions, and denounced the report as a body of insults on the Nigerian peoples and culture.
It said that the Nigerian military personnel have been raised, bred and further trained to protect lives and they will, therefore, not contemplate such evil of running a systematic and illegal abortion programme anywhere and anytime, on their own soil.
The Nigerian information minister, however, did not confirm if the authorities will initiate an investigation into the report.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Friday called on Nigerian authorities to investigate the allegations, UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said.
Nigeria’s defence chief said the military will not investigate the report, saying that the report was not true.
