Hauwa Liman, medical aid worker held hostage since March, has been killed by Islamist terrorists after their deadline expired, it was confirmed on Monday.
Three aid workers, Hauwa Mohammed Liman, Alice Loksha and Saifura Hussaini Ahmed Khorsa, were working in the town of Rann when they were kidnapped by Islamic State in West Africa (ISWA).
Khorsa, an International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) midwife, was killed in September.
Demands made in exchange for the release of the hostages have not been reported.
The militants said in a video posted online last month that they would kill at least one hostage once a deadline due to elapse on Monday had passed.
The video had also referred to schoolgirl Leah Sharibu, 15, who was abducted in February from her school in the town of Dapchi.
Liman worked in a hospital supported by the ICRC and Loksha as a nurse in a centre supported by UNICEF.
The ICRC appealed for lives to be spared on Sunday, as the deadline approached.
“We are hearing devastating reports that Hauwa has been executed. At this stage, we have no confirmation that this is true. We desperately hope not. This situation is heartbreaking and our thoughts remain with the family,” ICRC spokeswoman Krista Armstrong told Reuters in Geneva on Monday.
ISWA split from Boko Haram in 2016 and has killed hundreds of soldiers in attacks in northeastern Nigeria in the past few months, security and military sources have told Reuters.
Like Boko Haram, it wants to create a separate state in northeast Nigeria that adheres to a strict interpretation of Islamic law.
