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Militant Nigerian leader calls captives ‘our slaves’

In his first public claim acknowledging that Islamist Boko Haram militants abducted more than 200 teenage schoolgirls in Nigeria, Abubakar Shekau said in a video he would sell the girls because “they are our slaves.”

The majority of the abducted girls, ages 16 to 18, were from the Church of the Brethren in Nigeria, although the group included both Muslim and Christian girls, said a letter on May 6 from the Brethren headquarters in Elgin, Illinois.

The denomination has contributed more than $100,000 over the last year to support the Nigerian Brethren affected by the ongoing violence.