Nigeria Security Network member Zacharias Pieri analyses the latest video released by Boko Haram featuring some of the abducted Chibok schoolgirls. He also speculates about what Boko Haram may want.

Read the full article on Lapidomedia here. Excerpts are below.

“So, what will it take for Boko Haram to release the girls? The girls were captured to be converted to Islam, but also as a form of leverage. Addressing the Nigerian government, Shekau says: ‘It is now four or five years that you arrested our brethren and they are still in your prison’. The capturing of the schoolgirls comes as a form of retaliation for the capturing and imprisoning of Boko Haram fighters. For Shekau, ‘we will never release them (the schoolgirls) until after you release our brethren’. The message is simple. Boko Haram is willing to exchange the schoolgirls for their brethren in prison.”

“As pressure mounts on the Nigerian government to take some form of action, and to secure the safe release of the girls, the next week is likely to be critical. The Nigerian government has already said that Boko Haram is in no moral position to be making such demands, and that they will not accept an ultimatum. They are, however, open to some negotiations. If a resolution is not reached, the girls could be taken across the border into Chad or Cameroon (if they are not already there). And as Shekau promised in a previous message – he has no qualms with selling the girls at a market, or marrying them off to his fighters – even the ones as young as nine – ‘just as it was done to Aisha…wife of the Prophet’.”

Zacharias Pieri is based at the University of South Florida. His focus is on the ideological development of Boko Haram and the political and religious history of north-east Nigeria. He has a Masters Degree in Modern Middle East Studies and a PhD in Ethno-Politics.