Boko Haram News: Nigeria Top Security Aide Calls Soldiers 'Cowards' For Failing To Protect Innocent Civilians

Nigeria's national security adviser has called his own country's soldiers as "cowards" after they failed to protect civilians from Boko Haram extremists, denying suggestions that soldiers were not properly equipped to fight.

According to a report by The Guardian, Sambo Dasuki said many soldiers only joined the military ranks to have a job and were not really willing to fight after the Boko Haram overran the Nigerian garrison in the town of Baga earlier this month.

He rejected suggestions that the garrison was under-equipped, mentioning that the attackers even seized a substantial arsenal from the post as displayed by the group's leader Abubakar Shekau in a video posted online.

Among the equipment lost in Baga were six armored cars, each with 4,000 rounds of heavy ammunition, and artillery pieces.

"Anyone who is saying that they are not well armed is not telling the truth," the national security adviser to President Goodluck Jonathan said, as quoted by The Guardian. "We had a lot of cowards, and it turned out there was a problem in the recruitment process ... There were a lot of people who joined because they wanted a job, not because they wanted a career in the military. These are the people who ran away."

He also made clear to soldiers in the rank and file: "If you don't want to fight, get out of the army. Don't make excuses saying that you're poorly equipped."

Dasuki admitted that the last major procurement for army equipment was made over two decades ago, but added that sophisticated equipment is not needed in counter-insurgency operations.

The security official said that the recruitment is now being fixed while the army is undergoing retraining with British aid.

The United Nations Security Council earlier condemned "in the strongest terms" the intensifying attacks by Boko Haram in Nigeria, warning that some of the group's attacks "may amount to crimes against humanity."

The U.N. body also demanded that the group halt hostilities, saying their activities "are undermining the peace and stability of the West and Central African region."

"The Security Council demands that Boko Haram immediately and unequivocally cease all hostilities and all abuses of human rights and violations of international humanitarian law, and disarm and demobilize. The Security Council demands the immediate and unconditional release of all those abducted who remain in captivity, including the 276 schoolgirls abducted in Chibok, Borno State, in April 2014," the Security Council statement said.

The U.N. body, meanwhile, lauded the aid given by Nigeria's neighbors to refugees displaced by the conflict.