Would-be Boko Haram bomber 'caught by her ponytail'

A would-be suicide bomber who refused to detonate her explosives in northeast Nigeria was identified as she tried to flee because of her distinctive hairstyle, a military officer said today.
The officer, who was at the camp for displaced people in Dikwa, Borno state, when two other women blew themselves up on Tuesday, killing 58, said the third was spotted as she tried to leave.
"The Kanuri women are known for plaiting their hair but we realised over time from the bodies of female suicide bombers that they all had ponytails," he told AFP on condition of anonymity.
"Based on that we came to the conclusion, after a thorough investigation and the testimonies from female bombers arrested alive, that before going on suicide bombing they are made to wear a ponytail because in Kanuri traditions when a woman dies before she is buried her hair is loosened and made in to a ponytail.

"Because they (Boko Haram) assume these women would never return when sent on the suicide mission, they are given that ritual before they go out.
"So, when we saw her fleeing the camp with a ponytail, we just knew she was one of the bombers, so we arrested her and she confessed."

Many women wear a long hijab covering their head in the Muslim-majority north but the officer, who was involved in the arrest, said hers had slipped in the panicked aftermath.
The carnage at the camp, which houses more than 50,000 people who have fled nearly seven years of violence in the region, was the latest in a string of attacks against civilian targets.

Boko Haram, which is composed mainly of the ethnic Kanuri group indigenous to the region, has increasingly used suicide bombers, including young children, in its campaign to create a hardline Islamic state in northeast Nigeria.