Christopher Fomunyoh, a director at the US-based National Democratic Institute NDI, has said that about 80 children rescued from a Boko Haram camp in Cameroon in November cannot remember their own names or origins.
He visited the children recently in Yaounde, Cameroun.
According to the aid official, the children whose age ranges between 5 and 18, did not speak English, French or any local languages.
The children were found at a camp in northern Cameroon in November.
Nigeria-based Boko Haram militants have extended their campaign into Cameroon.
The militants are fighting to establish an Islamic caliphate in north-eastern Nigeria. They control several towns and villages in the region and recently pledged allegiance to the Islamic State (IS) militants, who have seized large areas of Syria and Iraq.
“The children were rescued in Cameroon after security forces – acting on a tip-off – raided what was thought to have been a Koranic school,” Fomunyoh said.
He added that the children are currently being rehabilitated at an orphanage in Yaounde.
He said the children had spent so long with their captors, being indoctrinated in jihadist ideology, that they had lost track of who they were.
“They’ve lost touch with their parents, they’ve lost touch with people in their villages, they’re not able to articulate, to help trace their relations, they can’t even tell you what their names are.”
Meanwhile, a suspected Boko Haram attack on Tuesday killed at least six people at a marketplace in the northern Nigerian town of Maiduguri. The suicide bombing was reportedly carried out by a middle-aged woman.
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