In spite of speculations that negotiations on a prisoner-hostage exchange between the Federal Government and the Boko Haram sects appear to be advancing, a senior United States Senator from Arizona, John Sidney McCain, has said the US military should rescue the 200 schoolgirls abducted in Nigeria by Islamist militant group, Boko Haram, even if the Nigerian government disapproves the move.
The long-time US senator told The Daily Beast that the US should feel no compunction to withhold sending special operations forces to find the kidnapped girls.
“If they knew where they were, I certainly would send in US troops to rescue them, in a New York minute I would, without permission of the host country,” McCain, two time Republican Party Presidential candidate in the US, said on Tuesday.
“I wouldn’t be waiting for some kind of permission from some guy named Goodluck Jonathan,” he declared, in reference to Nigeria’s president.
McCain had suggested in a CNN interview aired last week that if he were US president, his administration would have prepared special forces ready to enter Nigeria if a rescue opportunity was apparent.
He based his rationale for military intervention on the United Nations charter that frowns at “crimes against humanity.”
“The United Nations Charter recognized crimes against humanity, this fits into the category of crimes against humanity, and that gives any nation the license if they can to stop a crime against humanity, the same reason we should have if we could have freed the people at Dachau or Auschwitz,” McCain said.
McCain said the US need not receive permission from the Nigerian government, saying Nigeria would be glad to any effort that saves the abducted girls ad brings them back home.
* Some of the kidnapped schoolgirls in a video released by Boko Haram on Monday
“I would not be involved in the niceties of getting the Nigerian government to agree, because if we did rescue these people, there would be nothing but gratitude from the Nigerian government, such as it is,” he said.
It would be recalled that the Obama administration has said the Nigerian government has been reluctant to work with Washington in recent years in countering Boko Haram. This was the reason the US State Department did not officially label the Islamist group as a terror organization in 2011 and 2012.
Meanwhile, the Obama administration said Tuesday it will not negotiate with Boko Haram to retrieve the girls.
“We, as a matter of policy, deny kidnappers the benefits of their criminal acts, and that includes ransoms or other concessions,” White House press secretary Jay Carney said.
Following initial resistance, the Nigerian government now says it will negotiate with Boko Haram after aspokesman for the militant group said it would not return the girls unless the government released “our brethren.”
A report on The Daily Telegraph on Tuesday stated that Boko Haram will on Wednesday release a list of its members and members’ relatives that it wants freed in one-for-one exchanges for its hostages.
* Senator John mcCain wants US Special Forces to help rescue missing schoolgirls
“In total, the numbers to be released will probably be equal to the number of the girls currently held,” a source told The Telegraph.
The State Department said Monday that the US has sent manned surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft to assist Nigeria with the search effort. The US has also sent 27 security advisors to Nigeria. The State Department has also said that the US is seeking United Nations sanctions against Boko Haram.
“If we rescued these young girls, it would be the high point of the [President Obama’s] popularity,” McCain said.
However, another top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Sen. Bob Corker, told journalists that he would only advocate the use of US forces if the Nigerian government approved.
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