Boko Haram leader dismisses claims of his death in new video

Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau dismissed Nigerian military claims of his death in a new video obtained by AFP on Thursday and said the militants had implemented strict Islamic law in captured towns.

“Here I am, alive. I will only die the day Allah takes my breath,” Shekau said, adding that his group was “running our… Islamic caliphate” and administering strict sharia punishments.

Abubakar Shekau, Boko Haram leader and Alex Badeh, Chief of Defence Staff Nigeria’s military said last week that Shekau was dead and that a man who had been posing as the group’s leader in the videos had been killed after fighting with troops in the far northeast.

Security analysts and the United States questioned the credibility of the military’s claim.

The new 36-minute video showed Shekau, in combat fatigues and black rubber boots, standing on the back of a pick-up truck and firing an anti-aircraft gun into the air.

Standing in front of three camouflaged vans and flanked by four heavily armed, masked fighters, he then speaks for 16 minutes in Arabic and the Hausa language widely spoken in northern Nigeria.