Gunmen free Nigerian pupils taken in mass abduction

Kaduna state governor Uba Sani said they had been rescued thanks to the courage of the security forces. School authorities had said more than 280 children were taken, but the army said 137 hostages had been freed. It said the operation took place in the early hours of Sunday morning. Six mass abductions this month have rocked parts of northern Nigeria.

Kidnappers had demanded $690,000 (£548,000) for the release of the Kuriga children. The group was held for 17 days in total in the north-west of the country. Those kidnapped are usually freed after a ransom is paid. 76 girls and 61 boys rescued from Zamfara state, which borders Kaduna.

The government had said it would not pay any ransom. The mass abduction occurred on the morning of 7 March during assembly in a compound housing a junior and senior school. The students are being taken to Kaduna for medical tests before being allowed to see their families. 187 students from a secondary school and 125 from a local primary school were taken.

One pupil, believed to be 14-years-old, died after being shot by the gunmen. Most of the kidnaps in north-west Nigeria are thought to be the work of criminal gangs. There was global outrage when Islamist militants from the Boko Haram group seized nearly 300 girls in Nigeria’s north-eastern town of Chibok in 2014. The family of a group of sisters kidnapped in the capital, Abuja, denied a police statement that the security forces had rescued the girls.