''' NE NIGERIA : 2, 295 TEACHERS KILLED '''

By: Zainab

Unicef warning over school closures in NE Nigeria :

Most schools in the state worst hit by the Boko Haram conflict remain shut, the UN said on Friday, blaming the jihadists for deliberating targeting education.

Unicef, the UN children's agency, said at least 57 percent of schools in Berno state were closed as the new academic year begin this month, with teacher numbers as well as buildings badly hit by the violence.

More 2, 295 teachers have killed and 19, 000 displaced, while nearly 1, 400 schools have been  destroyed in eight years of fighting, it added in a statement.

Schools were shut because they were too badly damaged or were located in areas still deemed unsafe despite a sustained military fight back .

Unicef warned the situation threatened to create ''a lost generation of children, threatening their and the country's future'' if nothing was done.

The agency's deputy executive director Justin Forsyth said on a visit to the northeast that the effect of insurgency on ''education'' was 'no accident'.

''This was a deliberate strategy by Boko Haram to destroy opportunity for children to go to school''.