The group also refers to itself as Jama’atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda’awati Wal-Jihad, meaning “People Committed to the Propagation of the Prophet’s Teachings and Jihad.”
Boko Haram militants mainly inhabit areas in the northern states of Nigeria, specifically Yobe, Kano, Bauchi, Borno and Kaduna.
Originally, Boko Haram was referred to locally as the Nigerian Taliban because of their religious similarities to the Taliban.
Boko Haram does not engage in Nigeria’s political system out of an adherence to a fundamentalist form of Islam, which forbids participation unless the system is based on Sharia, or Islamic law.
Boko Haram militants targeted and robbed banks in 2011.
Timeline:
2002 – The group, which may have existed since the late 1990s, organizes under the Muslim cleric Mohammed Yusuf. It is centered in Maiduguri, the capital of the northeastern state of Borno.
December 2003 – The first known attack by Boko Haram includes roughly 200 militants, who attack multiple police stations in the state of Yobe, near the Niger border.
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June 7-8, 2014 – Suspected Boko Haram militants kidnap at least 20 young women over a weekend in the northeastern Nigeria village of Garkin Fulani, 8 kilometers from a town where more than 200 schoolgirls were taken nearly two months earlier.
June 18-22, 2014 – Boko Haram militants hold the village of Kummabza in Borno state, northeastern Nigeria, hostage for four days. They abduct more than 60 females, including children, and kill 30 men in the raid.
July 7, 2014 – Sources say sixty-three women and girls kidnapped by Boko Haram last month from the Kummabza village in northern Borno state, have escaped from their captors and returned to their village. Boko Haram is still believed to be holding about 200 schoolgirls abducted April 14 from a boarding school in the town of Chibok.
July 17-20, 2014 – Boko Haram raids the Nigerian town of Damboa. By the time the raid ends, 66 residents have been killed and more than 15,000 have fled.
October 16, 2014 – The Nigerian government announces they’ve reached a ceasefire agreement with the Islamist terror group that includes the promised release of more than 200 kidnapped schoolgirls.
November 1, 2014 – In a video, the group’s leader denies the Nigerian government’s claim of a ceasefire.
January 3, 2015 – A multi-day raid begins, where hundreds of Boko Haram gunmen seize the town of Baga and neighboring villages in northern Nigeria, as well as a multinational military base, leaving bodies scattered everywhere and as many as 2,000 people feared dead.
