by HAZARAN RAHIM DAD

From prison, Mahrang offers her perspective on the future of political dissent in Pakistan.

The Baloch Yakjehti Committee (BYC) has been advocating for Baloch rights since it was founded in 2020. Since its early days, when the movement was known as the Bramsh Yakjehti Committee, the BYC has organized peaceful protests against the excessive use of force by the Pakistani state in Balochistan – including forced disappearances, extrajudicial killings, and other forms of repression. 

Also since its beginning, the BYC has been led by women – including Dr. Mahrang Baloch. The 32-year-old became an activist after her father was “disappeared” in 2009. He was released – only to be abducted again in 2011, and this time killed. Ever since, Mahrang had been a central figure in the movement for human rights and justice in Balochistan, including being honored by Time magazine as of the 100 most influential leaders of 2024.

Led prominently by women, including Dr. Mahrang Baloch herself, the BYC represents a new generation of progressive political activism in a region long marred by conflict and marginalization. The Pakistani state has responded to this peaceful mobilization with a sweeping crackdown and arrests, disinformation campaigns, and detentions without due process. 

In March 2025, Mahrang – along with several other BYC leaders – was arrested, and she has been held in detention ever since, where they report “continuous mistreatment and harassment.” This exclusive interview with Mahrang, conducted via an intermediary who was able to visit her in prison, offers a rare and urgent insight into the thinking of a movement that, in recent months, has mobilized tens of thousands across Balochistan in protests against enforced disappearances and state repression. Mahrang offers her perspective on the current state of the BYC and its leadership while under state custody, as well as the broader challenge of extremism and the future of political activism and human rights advocacy under increased state repression and now threats from the Islamic State’s local branch.

In recent months, Balochistan has witnessed a troubling surge in religious extremism, most notably with the emergence of Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP), a group that appears to operate at both regional and international levels. This group has singled you out, publishing your photo in a booklet and labeling you as “evil” and a “Western puppet.” How do you respond to these personal attacks? And more broadly, what does the rise of such groups signal for the future of progressive politics in Balochistan?

Balochistan has a peculiar and complex history with religious extremism. However, the roots of this extremism are not embedded in Baloch society itself. Based on clear evidence, we assert that religious extremism was imposed upon Baloch society – it was, in a sense, installed from the outside. The influence of religious radicalism in Balochistan began to emerge prominently during the Afghan War and became more pronounced after 9/11.

If we study Baloch society from a historical perspective, it is inherently secular, a society that has traditionally embraced religious, ethnic, and regional tolerance and coexistence.

The emergence of Islamic State in Balochistan and the threats made against me or declaring me an apostate are not something new. For the past two decades, we have witnessed how religious extremists have been used as a tool against the progressive Baloch political movement and against progressive educators, writers, intellectuals, and journalists.

For example, Professor Saba Dashtiari, a Baloch intellectual and teacher at the University of Balochistan,  openly criticized the state for human rights violations in Balochistan. In 2011, he was murdered in broad daylight in front of the university. A religious extremist group claimed responsibility for his assassination through the media. Similarly, Professor Razzaq Zehri in Khuzdar was killed merely for promoting co-education and free education for all deserving students. Likewise, in Gwadar, Sir Zahid Askani was also murdered for the same reason. And just last year in Turbat, another educator, Sir Rauf Baloch, met a similar fate.

Progressive political activists in Balochistan, those who criticize the policies of the Pakistani state and advocate for human rights, face a dual threat. On one hand, they are subjected to enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings by the state of Pakistan. On the other hand, they receive death threats from religious extremist armed groups.

Last month, Islamic State released my photo, branded me a European agent and an apostate, and warned the public not to attend our events. This rhetoric mirrors the language used against me by ISPR [Inter-Services Public Relations, the media wing of the Pakistani military] in their press conferences. I had long anticipated that a group like Islamic State would eventually be activated and deployed against us, because we have been observing this pattern in Balochistan for the past 20 years, as exemplified by the cases I mentioned above.

I believe that threats from Islamic State or their activation against us will not significantly impact progressive politics in Balochistan. The Baloch political society has matured considerably, and the people of Balochistan are well aware of the truth, specifically, who is backing these religious extremists and why. The public fully understands this reality.

Our greatest success is that the majority of the Baloch people stand with us. And as long as that remains true, the use of extremist groups like Islamic State against us will not put an end to our struggle. The progressive political circles in Balochistan are deeply rooted. Tactics like these will not silence the progressive political movement in Balochistan, nor will threats from Islamic State silence us.

You have now been imprisoned for over three months. During this period, Pakistan’s military spokesperson, in multiple ISPR press briefings, has described you as a “proxy of terror” and used terms like “evil face” in reference to your activism. How do you respond to these characterizations by the state’s military apparatus?

For the past three months, I have been detained unlawfully. During this time, according to the information available to me, ISPR has mentioned me in three to four press conferences or media briefings. In each instance, the same baseless accusations were repeated, such as: “Mahrang is a proxy of terrorists,” or “Mahrang is a foreign agent,” and so on.

Despite being a powerful state with a 600,000-strong army, numerous intelligence agencies, and various civil institutions, ISPR has not presented even one piece of actual evidence against me. Instead, they have relied solely on false accusations and a media trial aimed at character assassination.

The military spokesperson has repeatedly misrepresented the press conference I held on March 19 at the Quetta Press Club. That press conference was not about the armed attack on the Jaffar Express or the return of the bodies of armed individuals. In reality, it was held to highlight the harassment faced by our fellow human rights defenders at the hands of Pakistani security forces. We had also submitted related cases to the United Nations Human Rights bodies.

The video and written transcript of that press conference are still publicly available in the media. At the end of the press conference, a journalist asked a question regarding the return of bodies lying in the Civil Hospital Quetta to their families. In response, I merely said that the bodies should be identified and handed over to the families, as this is their constitutional right. That is the only comment I made on the matter.

The full recording of the press conference exists, and any institution can verify that I made no unlawful or unconstitutional remarks during it.

The second allegation that the Pakistani military repeatedly makes against me and my colleagues is that we broke into the gates of the Civil Hospital Quetta to retrieve the bodies of armed individuals. I challenge the Pakistani military to provide evidence to support this claim. If they can, I will declare myself guilty. On that evening, I was at the Quetta Press Club, and afterward, I went straight to my home. Any independent investigative body is welcome to review CCTV footage from the Quetta Press Club and the city of Quetta, or to interview individuals present on that day.

My colleagues, our organization, the Baloch Yakjehti Committee (BYC), and I have consistently spoken out against violence and injustice. Wherever I’ve had the opportunity to speak or write, whether in Pakistan or internationally, I have clearly and unequivocally opposed violence. This is our well-established policy.

I believe the real issue ISPR and the Pakistani military have with us is that we raise our voices against the state’s violent policies and human rights violations in Balochistan. We question them, we hold different views, and our position has gained international recognition. Our peaceful struggle has been acknowledged globally, and our voice is being heard. This is what troubles the Pakistani military most.

That is why ISPR, in its repeated press conferences, is branding me and our organization, the BYC, as terrorists without providing a shred of evidence. The purpose of these statements is clearly to create a false international narrative that Mahrang and the BYC are proxies of terrorists, in an attempt to silence international discourse on human rights violations in Balochistan and to delegitimize our voice.

The Diplomat for more

by ANDI ZEISLER

New technology has always been used against women. Why should we trust artificial intelligence not to be?

It’s here. It’s there. Everywhere you look, AI.

Each Google search returns a lengthy AI summary before providing links to relevant search results. Chatbots pop up as soon as you go online to make flight reservations or pay a credit card bill. Start writing an email and an AI prompt appears right in the middle of a sentence: Hi! Looks like you’re writing an email! Can I help? Hmmm? What about now?

A world in which we can use AI is quickly becoming one in which we have little choice in the matter, and apparently, women in particular need to step it up. The language used in recent reports like “Women are avoiding AI. Will their careers suffer?” and “Women are lagging behind on AI but they can catch up” are instructive: “Falling behind” men in AI adoption, women are “reluctant” to get on board and “in denial” about AI’s “all-consuming importance.” But the encouragement toward more widespread adoption ignores one reason women might be side-eyeing AI omnipresence: The virtual revolution has repeatedly made them targets of real-world aggression. Advertisement:

Caution ? technophobia

The recent reporting on women and AI starts from the thesis that women aren’t using AI at the same rates as men are, and that is bad. But why is it bad? There’s no indication that women are refusing to comply with the mandated use of AI tools; they’re just slower to choose them. In not specifying what men are accomplishing with AI that women aren’t, these pieces can only imply that AI is important because a lot of men are using it. But a narrative in which women must catch up to men or lose out serves a specific purpose: It reifies existing stereotypes about women as not naturally interested in STEM fields.

Dr. Kerry McInerney, an AI ethicist at the University of Cambridge who co-hosts the podcast “The Good Robot,” points out that this narrative also conflates caution and technophobia. “Critically questioning technology is not the same as being anti-technology,” she says. “Because of a wide range of gender stereotypes we consume from childhood on, it might be that there is a gendered reluctance to adopt these tools when they’re very new.” But, she says, this doesn’t mean it’s forever: Smart home devices are among the products that quickly become normalized for people of all genders.

Salon for more

by JANET MCINTOSH

From boot camp battle cries to battlefield euphemisms, US military deploys ‘kill talk’ to suppress empathy and normalize violence

Night after night, the buses pull up on the tarmac outside the Parris Island Marine Corps recruit training center in South Carolina. Usually, they are full of young men—still boys, by some measures—with a nervous feeling in the pit of their stomachs. They will have sensed the air getting heavy and sticky, and they might have noticed a swampy stench. They’ve seen enough movies to know what comes next, but they still find it startling.

A drill instructor storms the bus, shirt tight around his muscles, belt seeming to float around his flat abdomen, roaring at the neophytes from under his circular hat brim.

“SIT UP STRAIGHT! From this point forward, you will only answer me with a YES, sir, NO, sir, AYE-AYE, sir. DO WE UNDERSTAND?”

“YES, SIR!” yell the recruits.

“Now get OFF MY BUS! NOW, NOW, NOW!”

The young men hustle to plant themselves on a row of yellow footprints painted on the road. The yelling follows them, an acoustic assault so thick and fast and strangely inflected that each recruit has to listen hard and use herd behavior to know what to do next.

They know they’re about to be transformed, but they are unlikely to recognize all the subterranean dynamics of this change and how the acoustic qualities of boot camp will reshape them into hardened killers. These qualities will also model the disintegration of their personhood and their necropolitical abjection—that is, their killability in the eyes of the state.

Military language

In the face of war’s brutality, language might seem like an incidental detail. But United States combat veterans who pay attention to it will attest that embodied ways of speaking—from yelling to cursing to joking, and beyond—can be intimately bound with experiences of kinetic violence.

By attenuating thought and agency, yelling can alter recruits’ sense of self. Drill instructors in the Marine Corps also tinker with recruits’ idea of selves by announcing shortly after their arrival that “the words ‘I,’ ‘me,’ ‘my’ are no longer part of recruits’ vocabulary. Instead, they are to refer to themselves as ‘recruit [last name]”. Drill instructors agree this lexical system is designed to foreclose egocentrism and stop recruits from thinking of themselves as individuals.

In 2016, Sergeant Jennifer Duke explained to PBS NewsHour, “We need to break down these individualities that they come with, of self and ‘me’ and ‘I.’ We need to break them down to basically nothing so we can build them back up… as one team, one element, to join our Marine Corps. It’s not my Marine Corps, or his Marine Corps, it’s our Marine Corps.”

In Marxist theorist Louis Althusser’s terms, we could say that recruits must “self-interpellate” as cogs in the military machine. Drill instructors never use recruits’ personal names; instead, official regulations permit them to call recruits “recruit [last name]” or to address them by their billet or job, such as “scribe” or “guide.”

This practice carries a whiff of military necropolitics, whereby each individual serves a role in the military machine and is easily replaced if they become ineffective or are killed.

To facilitate state necropolitics, US military culture is saturated by “kill talk” among those who serve as instruments of combat. The defining feature of kill talk is its refusal to acknowledge the full relational humanity of and the terrible loss suffered by those on whom potentially deadly violence is inflicted.

I think of kill talk as a kind of linguistic infrastructure—a loose collection of disparate verbal strategies that guide soldiers in how to perceive, feel, think, and ultimately act in combat. This infrastructure underpins the experience of having what the philosopher Judith Butler calls a “frame of war,” which, in simplest terms, is a structure that selectively carves up experience, fostering indifference to certain deaths.

These patterns of language matter partly because they make war more doable. Military combat asks too much of a human being. People’s minds are not well equipped to assimilate the full implications or the moral depth of killing or being killed; such a reckoning could debilitate one’s ability to live, let alone function on behalf of the military machine.

As psychiatrist Robert Jay Lifton puts it, “There has to be some level of detachment”—some “psychic numbing”—to apply one’s technical skills in war. Military language offers a supreme instrument to facilitate this detachment. Such detachment can potentially enhance military force—the volume of fire in a firefight, the relentless pressure applied during a siege, and so forth—while offering a kind of rescue for the combatant.

But there is a terrible cost to this facilitation: If kill talk makes violence more feasible for combatants, it spells more death, mayhem, and misery for the individuals and societies targeted by such violence, and sometimes for the combatants themselves.

While kill talk may feel to combatants like a necessary kind of detachment, it can be jarring—even incomprehensible—to civilians. Just consider, for instance, the public disturbance in 2023 when Prince Harry described his mindset in his memoir as he killed 25 Taliban.

Asia Times for more

by DANIELLA FERNANDEZ

On February 11, 2025, as more than 50,000 hectares of forests burned in Patagonia in the heat of the Argentine summer, the government of the southern province of Chubut, led by Ignacio Agustín Torres, ordered simultaneous police operations against 12 Indigenous Mapuche communities.

The raids were brutal: houses were sacked, elderly people were beaten in front of children, books were seized, community radio stations were pillaged, and Victoria “Vic” Núñez Fernández was arrested.

Núñez Fernández, a 37-year-old born in Ituzaingó, Buenos Aires, first arrived at Lof Pillañ Mawiza, a community located in Corcovado, Chubut, in 2020. The mere presence of a vehicle similar to theirs in the general vicinity of the raid was enough to implicate them as a co-perpetrator of the Amancay ranch fire on Route 71. They were charged with three criminal counts, including participation in an illegal association and disturbing the peace. Contrary to statements by government sources, Núñez Fernández is not of Mapuche descent.

Argentina’s judicial and media apparatus used Núñez Fernández’s arrest as part of a campaign of criminalization and disinformation they have been building for decades. In this narrative, the Mapuche and Tehuelche peoples of Patagonia are presented as “terrorists” and enemies of the state, as are allies who work in solidarity with Indigenous peoples. This has extended to include volunteer fire fighters, who, at the beginning of the year, tried to put out the fires the government ignored.

On closer examination, there’s a recurring pattern behind the fires and state violence. The objective is to clear the way for the handover of territories to real estate developers, extractive industries, and military forces. Without resistance from Indigenous peoples and activists, Patagonia could be made available to business interests and carved up to suit foreign investors.

Ojala for more

by TARIQ ALI & DAVID BARSAMIAN

In the following interview, Ali and Barsamian discuss the complex political dynamics between the United States and Pakistan, the historical context of U.S. foreign policy, and the broader implications of the global war on terrorism, emphasizing the manipulation of media narratives and the neglect of historical awareness in shaping public perception. (SOURCE: Ali, Tariq, and David Barsamian. “Tariq Ali.” Progressive 66, no. 1 (January 2002): 31-4.)

[In the following interview, originally conducted in November 2001, Ali discusses the relationship between the United States and Pakistan as well as the worldwide war on terrorism.]

Tariq Ali was born in 1943 in Lahore, in what was then British-controlled India. He was educated in Pakistan and then at Oxford. His opposition to the military dictatorship in Pakistan during the 1960s led to permanent exile in Britain. He was active in the anti-war movement in Europe during the late 1960s.

Ali is a longstanding editor of New Left Review and has written more than a dozen books on history and politics. His forthcoming book is The Clash of Fundamentalism: Crusades, Jihad, and Modernity. He also has been working on two sets of novels. Three novels of the “Islamic Quintet” have been published by Verso: Shadows of the Pomegranate Tree, The Book of Saladin, and The Stone Woman. They portray Islamic civilization in a way that he says “run counter to the standard views.” His “Fall of Communism” trilogy has seen the publication of Redemption and Fear of Mirrors. Ali’s creative output extends to scripts for stage and screen. A short play of his on Iraq was recently performed at Cooper Union in New York. A veritable “all ’rounder,” as they say in South Asia, he is currently working on an opera on Ayatollah Khomeini.

In late October, he was detained at the Munich airport. “The inspector’s eyes fell on a slim volume in German that had been given to me by a local publisher,” he said. “It was still wrapped in cellophane. In a state of some excitement, the inspector rushed it over to an armed policeman. The offending book was an essay by Karl Marx, On Suicide.” Ali said he was rudely instructed to repack his bag, minus the book, and was then taken to police headquarters at the airport. The arresting officer, Ali added, “gave me a triumphant smile and said, ‘After September 11, you can’t travel with books like this.’ At this point, my patience evaporated.”

Ali demanded to call the mayor of Munich, who had earlier interviewed him on the current crisis at a public event in the city. The threat of the call was sufficient, and Ali was allowed to continue on his journey.

Ali lives in London, and I spoke with him in late November by phone.

[Barsamian]: A Pakistani general once told you, “Pakistan was the condom that the Americans needed to enter Afghanistan. We’ve served our purpose and they think we can be just flushed down the toilet.” That was in the 1980s, when the United States and Pakistan funded and armed the mujahedeen to defeat the godless Soviet Union. Is the United States again using Pakistan as a condom?

[Ali]: I think the Americans fished out the same condom but found it had too many holes in it. So they supplied a new one, and they’ve gone in again. But this time they couldn’t go in with the Pakistani army, since the Pakistani army created the Taliban and propelled it to victory. It could hardly be expected to kill its own offspring. The U.S. forced the Pakistani army to withdraw its support, which it did, reluctantly. But it had to. Once Pakistani support was withdrawn from the Taliban, they collapsed like a house of cards, though one hardline faction will probably carry on in the mountains for a bit.

Most Americans may not know the history of Pakistani-U.S. support for the Taliban. In a talk you gave in late September, you said, “People are taught to forget history.” What did you have in mind there?

Enotes for more

THE AFRICAN MIRROR

THE United Nations Human Rights Office has condemned Egypt’s use of a detention practice known as “rotation” that allows authorities to hold government critics indefinitely through successive charges, calling for its immediate cessation.

UN Human Rights Office spokesperson Thameen Al-Kheetan said the practice involves bringing new charges against individuals as they near completion of prison sentences or reach maximum pretrial detention periods, effectively preventing their release.

“Human rights defenders, activists, lawyers, journalists, peaceful protesters and political opponents have been targeted by this ‘rotation’ practice,” Al-Kheetan told reporters at the UN’s bi-weekly press briefing in Geneva.

The latest case involves poet Galal El-Behairy, who was detained after completing a prison term on July 31, 2021, for writing songs and poetry critical of the government. Since then, he has faced similar charges in two separate cases under counter-terrorism law and the penal code. New charges were filed against him on August 19, 2025, extending his detention for at least 15 more days.

Other prominent figures subjected to the rotation practice include writer and activist Alaa Abdel Fattah; lawyer and former National Council for Human Rights member Hoda Abdel-Moneim; lawyer Ebrahim Metwally Hegazy, who coordinates the Association of the Families of the Forcibly Disappeared; and political activist Mohammad Adel Fahmy Ali, former spokesperson for the April 6 Youth Movement. All remain in detention.

Al-Kheetan said most of those targeted “should not have been detained or jailed in the first place,” as charges often relate to exercising legitimate rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly. He described the practice as a tool for the Egyptian government to repress perceived critics.

The African Mirror for more

by ZARAH SULTANA

Zarah Sultana is among Britain’s most prominent socialist leaders. Born in Birmingham in 1993, she became politically active in the student movement and later in the upsurge of Corbynism: serving on the national executive of Young Labour, working as a community organiser for the party and eventually running for parliament, where she now represents Coventry South. Her election coincided with the beginning of Keir Starmer’s Labour leadership, which she has long excoriated for its reactionary outlook and petty authoritarianism. Over the past year her profile has increased significantly thanks to her trenchant opposition to the Starmer government’s complicity in the Gaza genocide. Her dissent led to her suspension from the parliamentary party, and since then she has become a standard-bearer for the nascent left alternative: one of the youngest and most popular figures involved in its formation. Sultana has proposed co-leading the new party alongside Corbyn, and is part of a group working on the founding conference this autumn. 

For the third instalment in this Sidecarseries, Oliver Eagleton spoke to Sultana about the new left party: why it is necessary, what kind of democratic structures it should have, its parliamentary and extra-parliamentary aims, its response to the far right, the case for co-leadership, and how the conference should be organised.

Oliver Eagleton: Let’s start with your political trajectory and relationship with the Labour Party. How has it evolved over time? What brought you to the decision to leave earlier this year? Do you think others on the so-called ‘Labour left’ will follow you? 

Zarah Sultana: I was formed politically by the War on Terror and the aftermath of the financial crisis. The first time I engaged with parliamentary politics was when the coalition government launched a direct attack on my generation by tripling tuition fees; I was part of the first cohort who had to pay £9,000 per year for higher education. I decided to join Labour at the age of seventeen, because at that time it seemed like there was no other party that could act as a vehicle for change. I never thought it was perfect. My local branch in the West Midlands was controlled by older men who didn’t want young people – especially not young left-wing women – to be involved. When I went to study at Birmingham in 2012, the Labour clubs and societies did nothing other than host talks by right-wing MPs, so I had to find other political outlets.

In my first week of university my dad and I joined a delegation of Labour councillors and activists who went on a trip to the occupied West Bank, and it changed the way I saw myself. I had never previously thought of myself as privileged, but I realised that because of the sheer accident of where I was born and what passport I held, I was treated differently by the Israeli authorities. I watched as they harassed and abused Palestinians and then related to me as a regular human being. I went to Hebron and saw the Jewish-only roads, the communities who were coming under daily attack from settlers and soldiers. All this was hard to fathom. But it was even more confounding that we – our country, our society – were allowing this to happen. So that ignited an internationalism in me: a deep opposition to imperial power, apartheid, settler colonialism and military occupation. 

Then when I got involved in the National Union of Students I realised that I wasn’t the only one who felt this way. That’s a really magical moment, when you discover that you’re not alone in your politics. I started campaigning on issues like free education, maintenance grants, anti-racism, housing, Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions. It was only after I graduated, though, that I learned just how broken our social contract was. I really struggled to find work. I would go to the Jobcentre, look through my CV and wonder why, despite my degree and my experience, I didn’t have a place in this economy. And of course I was also saddled with £50,000 worth of debt. 

Sidecar — New Left Review for more

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by SAKIB SHERANI

“Underdevelopment occurs not because of lack of capital: capital can easily be raised; it occurs not because of lack of skilled people: people can be trained; it occurs because of the failure of a society to organise itself for development…” Albert O. Hirschman (The Strategy of Economic Development, 1958).

On Pakistan’s 78th independence anniversary, we have to ask ourselves a sobering question — why is the country that was born on the wings of hope, between promise and peril, and seemingly prospered for decades, in its current dismal state? Why are its human, social and economic development indicators competing with Afghanistan and sub-Saharan Africa? Why have numerous promised ‘game changers’ over the decades, from CENTO and SEATO membership to CPEC and SIFC, failed to deliver for the people?

The answer is simple as much as it is uncomfortable. Pakistan is not organised as a polity for development, let alone inclusive development. It is organised for elite extraction, appropriation, expropriation and enrichment. And the two models are not just incompatible, they are mutually exclusive.

A society is organised for development when its laws, institutions, cultural norms and incentives are deliberately structured to expand opportunity, raise productivity and channel resources towards the most optimal use for the widest common good. Economies that have successfully climbed the ladder of development, at least over the past five decades, display common characteristics. These include an emphasis on human capital development, high savings and investment rates, an equitable and non-discriminatory tax regime, responsible governance, high levels of transparency and accountability, institutional checks and balances against executive overreach as well as policy and regulatory capture.

Pakistan’s current organising principle as a polity is incompatible with development.

This is in sharp contrast to how Pakistan has been configured as a polity. To adapt Lant Pritchett et al’s quote, countries such as Pakistan “look like a state” but do not exhibit the foundational characteristics.

Pakistan has a Constitution but one that fails to restrain, to provide checks and balances; it has ‘law of the land’ without rule of law; governments without governance; buildings without institutions; projects without purpose; spending without impact; civil service without service; security agencies without security. Like many other Third World countries, Pakistan has been organised as a neocolonial project with local elites installed on behalf of former colonial powers. Two natural corollaries of elite capture are weakened institutional checks and balances, and extraction.

Dawn for more

by IBRAHIM ADEYEMI

In North-central Nigeria, terrorists are weaponising hunger as a strategy to recruit vulnerable children into their fold. They would ravage specific areas, destroying their crops and farming infrastructures, looting stores and private houses, and then position themselves as the only source of food for children. Ibrahim Adeyemi Follow on X June 2, 2025

Hassan Audu is lost in the past.

Tricked into a Boko Haram camp in Niger State, North-central Nigeria, the 16-year-old is mired in the mud of his traumatic experience as a child soldier. He is a witness to the terror and tragedy devastating his hometown of Shiroro. He struggles to move towards a glimpse of the future. Audu’s nine-year-old brother, Ja’afar Hassan, was caught in Boko Haram’s vicious net in 2022, with families and friends thrown into agony that the terrorists had conscripted their beloved son. For years, no one could trace Ja’afar’s footpaths to the camp; his parents wallowed in pain, begging local authorities in the Mashekeri village of Shiroro to help retrieve their son.

When Ja’afar’s captors sauntered into the village in 2024 for their exploits, they encountered a weary Audu, exhausted from his desperate search for his younger brother. The terrorists took advantage of his desperation, asking him to follow them into the forest to retrieve his brother. He hopped on a motorbike, wedged among the terrorists, as the rider zigzagged his way toward the forest’s edge.

“They asked me to come see my brother. When I arrived, they locked me up in a mud cell,” Audu tells HumAngle. “We used three motorcycles, two people each, including the one I was on. They asked me to come with them and see my brother. Since I knew my brother was with them, I went along.”

The boy wears a sour face and a sober appearance, beaming softness and stone-heartedness simultaneously. One minute, his eyes catch tears during the interview in a secured location in the Hudawa area of Kaduna State in northwestern Nigeria, and the next minute, he carries a terrifying face, stirring up a panic-stricken atmosphere.

Concerned that he might go rogue if allowed to travel alone, Audu’s stepmother, Laraba, accompanied him from Zamfara to Kaduna to speak with HumAngle. Since returning from the terrorist den, his chances of going berserk have been high, according to the stepmother, who noted that the boy has lost his tenderness as a teenager, occasionally displaying wild behaviour and betraying a civil demeanour. Blame him, but also blame the men who lured him into the valley of violence, keeping him in the logistics unit of the camp where he witnessed how terrorists planned attacks, brutally punished offenders, and detained civilians for ransom. 

The terrorists fed him enough tuwo, a local Nigerian meal made from maize, and a hastily prepared tomato soup. He had wanted to return home the same night with his brother, but fed like a cat, Audu stayed, with the terrorists promising more sumptuous meals if he swallowed their rulings. He had more than three square meals that he couldn’t have at home. Back in Mashekeri, a single solid meal daily was a luxury. The boy found that luxury in multiple folds in the terrorist camp and stayed glued to it, quickly forgetting his initial mission to bring his brother back home.

“I never missed home. Whenever I mentioned home, they would say, ‘Some other time.’ Since then, the feeling of returning home faded,” Audu tells HumAngle.

Human Angle for more