US spy planes join search for missing girls

The Pentagon is conducting manned surveillance and reconnaissance flights over Nigeria as part of the search for nearly 300 missing schoolgirls kidnapped by Boko Haram, a senior administration official said Tuesday.

{mosads}The administration is also sharing commercial satellite imagery with the Nigerian government, which gave the U.S. permission to conduct the manned flights.

Those steps come in addition to an interdisciplinary team dispatched to the American Embassy in Abuja, which is providing logistical and technical support as the Nigerian government searches for the missing schoolgirls.

“We are consistently reviewing our progress and will adapt our approach as needed,” the official said.

On Monday, White House press secretary Jay Carney said that broader support, including “the ability to provide intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance support,” was “always envisioned” as part of a broader effort to assist the Nigerian government.

But the White House spokesman refused to say what type of support that would include, or whether the use of drone surveillance was under consideration. On Monday, The Washington Post reported the administration was considering the deployment of unmanned vehicles in addition to its existing efforts. Carney also said the interdisciplinary advisory team dispatched to the region was “in place” and working to coordinate with the Nigerian government.

“There are five State Department officials, including a team leader, two strategic communications experts, a civilian security expert, and a regional medical support officer; 10 Department of Defense planners and advisors who were already in Nigeria and have been redirected to provide support to the kidnapping response; seven additional DOD advisors from AFRICOM [U.S. Africa Command]; four FBI officials with expertise in safe recovery, negotiations, and preventing future kidnappings,” Carney said. “So they are digging in on the search and coordinating closely with the Nigerian government, and we obviously want to do whatever we can to assist that effort.”

But the White House spokesman cautioned that U.S. officials faced a tall task as they sought recovery of the girls, who were kidnapped a month ago from their school in the northeastern village of Chibok.

“The area that the Nigerian government is looking for the girls in constitutes roughly the size of New England,” Carney said, calling the search “extremely difficult.”

On Monday, the administration also said it was combing over a video purportedly showing some of the girls in search of clues. Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau said the girls had converted from Christianity to Islam, and offered to trade them in exchange for the release of members of organizations imprisoned by the government in Abuja.

“If you want us to release your girls we kidnapped, those of them that have not accepted Islam, they are now gathered in numbers. And we treat them well the way the prophet would treat well any infidel he seized. They are staying [with us]. We will never release them until our brethren are released,” Shekau says in the video.

“We use every clue possible to see how it can contribute to finding the girls,” said State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki.