Dozens of schoolchildren, teachers and their relatives have been abducted by gunmen in central Nigeria after an attack on a boarding school, the latest in a rising wave of mass abductions and attacks that have beset the country. A spokesperson for the Niger state government said 27 students, three teachers and a dozen family members of school staff, 42 people in total, were taken. Earlier reports had indicated hundreds were missing from the school of about 1,000 students. Heavily armed gunmen dressed in military uniforms overran the all-boys Government Science College (GSC) in Kagara Town, Niger state, on Tuesday night into Wednesday morning, killing at least one student. The attack is thought to have been carried out by suspected armed groups known as “bandits” that have terrorised north-west and central Nigeria in recent years. The groups have launched marauding attacks from forest havens which span across north-west Nigeria into neighbouring Niger, terrorising vulnerable rural communities left helpless by a dearth of security. Killings, sexual violence and mass kidnappings for ransom have risen sharply, including on schools.
SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN