Nigeria’s army says it has rescued 178 people held by the Islamist militant group Boko Haram.<br /><br /> It said the captives – more than 100 of them children – were liberated in northern Borno state, the heartland of the insurgency. The military said 67 of those freed were women.<br /><br /> A Boko Haram commander is also said to have been captured and several camps cleared in the military operation.<br /><br /> President Muhammadu Buhari has pledged to eradicate the group which has killed thousands of people in a six-year insurgency in Nigeria’s northeast. It has also been blamed for deadly attacks in neighbouring countries.<br /><br /> A joint taskforce of 8,700 troops from Nigeria, Cameroon, Niger, Chad and Benin was due to have started operations against the Islamists on July 31 but it has been dogged by a lack of funding and political resolve.<br /><br /> More than 200 girls are still missing after being abducted by Boko Haram from a school in Chibok in Nigeria in April 2014.<br /><br /> Boko Haram is fighting to establish an Islamist st
