Nigeria’s security forces routinely torture men, women and children – some as young as 12 – to get bogus confessions or simply to extort money, according to a report published Thursday. Many of the details in the seven-year study by Amnesty International are too graphic to report, but methods employed in the country’s torture chambers allegedly include sexual violence, electric shocks and extracting finger nails with pliers. "The pain of torture is unbearable," said Moses Akatugba, who was tortured while on death row after what Amnesty said was a sham trial. "I never thought I would be alive till this day. The pain I went through in the hands of the officers was unimaginable," Akatugba told the organization.
Amnesty said it conducted interviews during 20 trips to Nigeria. It said the alleged victims were often taken from their homes without warning in large dragnet operations, sometimes under the pretext of arresting suspected members of Nigerian terror group Boko Haram. At least 5,000 people have been detained in anti-Boko Haram operations since 2009 – many of these were tortured, according to Amnesty.
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