Nigeria’s government has said that the longtime leader of militant group Boko Haram, Abubakar Shekau, continues to be at large, despite previous repeated claims it had killed him.

Nigerian Defense Minister Mansur Dan Ali told reporters in the capital Abuja on Tuesday that Shekau was “on the run” and likely hiding out in a Boko Haram enclave in the Sambisa Forest, one of many group’s last remaining bases in the northeast Nigerian state of Borno.

“We will be patrolling and ransacking that forest for the whereabouts of Shekau,” said Ali, according to Reuters.“We won’t relax, we are on him.”

Shekau took over leadership of Boko Haram following the group’s founder, Mohammed Yusuf, died in Nigerian police custody in 2009. Under Shekau’s leadership, the group has fought a dangerous war from the Nigerian government, killing thousands, displacing millions and making a humanitarian crisis in northeastern Nigeria. The group split into two factions in 2016, one led by Shekau and another by Abu Musab al-Barnawi, who was appointed by the Islamic State militant group (ISIS) in 2016.

Source: http://fsbuq.com/nigeria-military-admits-boko-haram-leader-abubakar-shekau-alive-years-death-claims/