The number of children fleeing the Boko Haram insurgency in Nigeria doubled in the past year to about 800,000, with women and girls targets of abduction for sexual abuse by the militants, according to a United Nations Children's Fund report.
Boko Haram's six-year campaign to impose Islamic law in Nigeria has forced more than 1.5 million people from their homes, according to UNICEF. The number of displaced includes 1.2 million inside Nigeria, with about 200,000 crossing into neighboring Cameroon, Chad and Niger, stretching social services, health care and other facilities in host communities.
"Countless numbers of children, women and men have been abducted, abused and forcibly recruited, and women and girls have been targeted for particularly horrific abuse, including sexual enslavement," UNICEF said. "Children have also become weapons, made to fight alongside armed groups and at times used as human bombs."