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SUMMARY
Boko Haram, a violent Nigerian Islamist movement, has grown increasingly active and deadly in its attacks against state and civilian targets in recent years, drawing on a narrative of resentment and vengeance for state abuses to elicit recruits and sympathizers. The group's April 2014 abduction of almost 300 schoolgirls has drawn international attention, including from the Obama Administration and Members of Congress. Periodic attacks against foreign targets in the region and growing evidence of ties to Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), a regional terrorist network affiliated with Al Qaeda, have also raised the concern of U.S. policymakers. The State Department named several individuals linked to Boko Haram, including its leader, Abubakar Shekau, as Specially Designated Global Terrorists in 2012, and Boko Haram was designated as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) by the U.S. State Department in November 2013. The Obama Administration does not currently consider Boko Haram to be an affiliate of Al Qaeda.
More than 4,000 people are estimated to have been killed in Boko Haram-related violence, making it one of the deadliest terrorist groups in the world. U.N. and Nigerian officials report that more than six million Nigerians have been affected by the conflict between Boko Haram and the Nigerian government, and more than 300,000 have been displaced. The group has focused on a wide range of targets, but civilians in the impoverished, predominately Muslim northeast have borne the brunt of the violence. Nigeria's heavy-handed response to Boko Haram's insurgent and terrorist operations has also taken a toll on civilians and complicated U.S. efforts to pursue greater counterterrorism cooperation with the Nigerian government, in spite of shared concerns about Boko Haram and its ties to regional and international terrorist groups and operatives. Coordination on counterterrorism efforts has also been hampered at times by a lack of cooperation from Nigerian officials.
U.S. policy toward Boko Haram reflects both the Administration's perception of the threat the group poses and the strategic importance of the U.S. relationship with Nigeria. At this point Boko Haram appears to pose a threat primarily to stability in northern Nigeria, and potentially to surrounding areas in neighboring countries. Some of Boko Haram's attacks have targeted Christian communities in the north, threatening to fuel existing religious tensions...