Boko Haram militants have pulled off their most brazen act yet – attacking the home compound of the Vice Prime Minister of Cameroon and kidnapping the official’s wife.  It shows the terrorist group is pushing its insurgency beyond Nigeria’s borders.

The gunmen seized the wife of Vice Prime Minister Amadou Ali in the raid, while Ali himself managed to flee.  Earlier Boko Haram had abducted a traditional leader and his family in an early-morning raid on the community near the Nigerian border.  In the past few days, Boko Haram got into gun battles with Cameroonian troops, killing several.

The name “Boko Haram” translates from the local language as “Western Education is Forbidden”.   The group opposes western schools and culture and is trying to carve out an Islamist state out of northern Nigeria, and base it on its severe interpretation of Sharia law.  Boko Haram is still holding around 219 Nigerian schoolgirls abducted in April, as well as ten Chinese construction workers kidnapped a month later.