Some retired and active senior military officers can no longer enter the United States or the United Kingdom owing to allegations of human rights violations against the military, it has been revealed.

The revelation was made on Wednesday during the presentation of the report of a Board of Inquiry instituted by the army to investigate alleged human rights abuse by the military in the north-east and also in the handling of pro-Biafra protests.

The report, presented by Nuhu Angbazo, a Major-General and Head of the Nigerian Army Civil Relations, and Sani Usman, Director of Army Public Relations, observed that even though no court of law or military Board of Inquiry had found any serving or retired military officer guilty of any human rights abuse, at least two diplomatic missions either revoked or denied their country entry visas to a number of senior officers who held command responsibilities during the military operations in the north-east.

The committee exonerated the army of any alleged sexual abuse of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in the north-east, but Angbazo said the allegations led to the withdrawal and denial of US and UK visas to some serving and retired senior officers.

“There were cases of officers whose names did not appear in the allegation but were also denied visas,” THISDAY quoted him as saying.

“AHQ (army headquarters) subsequently conducted an investigation and disseminated the reports to all relevant authorities, including the U.S. authorities through the DA (defence attaché) Washington.

“The U.S. however conveyed its dissatisfaction with the report and requested that a more comprehensive inquiry be conducted. Thus a Special BOI (Board of Inquiry) was constituted to investigate the allegations.”

Angbazo said the nine-man panel was presided over by AT Jibrin, a retired Major-General.