As many as 200 girls
were abducted from their boarding school in
northeastern Nigeria by heavily armed Boko
Haram Islamists who arrived in trucks, vans and
buses, according to CNN's report.
The group has recently stepped up attacks in
the region, and its leader released a video last
month threatening to kidnap girls from schools.
Dozens of gunmen stormed the Government Girls
Secondary School in Chibok, about 130 km (81
miles) west of Maiduguri, on Monday night as
the students slept in their dormitories, officials
said. They engaged the soldiers guarding the
school in a lengthy gun battle and then herded
the girls onto vehicles.
"Many girls were abducted by the rampaging
gunmen who stormed the school in a convoy of
vehicles," said Emmanuel Sam, an education
official in Chibok.
Sam could not say exactly how many
girls were kidnapped, but one
student who managed to get away
said at least 200 students were
taken.
"The Boko Haram attackers came to
town around 9 p.m. and made
straight for the school where they
had a gun battle with soldiers
stationed at the school and killed
two soldiers," said Chibok resident
Maina Babagana.
The gunmen then burned homes and
businesses in the town in Borno
state as they fled with the girls,
witnesses said.
according to CNN ,A military spokesman in the region declined to
comment on the abduction, saying the Nigerian
Defence Ministry would issue statement later.
A student who was among about a dozen girls
who managed to escape from their abductors
recounted her ordeal.
"They forced us into trucks, buses and vans,
some of which were carrying food stuffs and
petrol. They left with us in a convoy into the
bush," said the student, who declined to be
named for security reasons. "A group of
motorcyclists flanked the convoy to ensure none
of us escaped."
At one point, one of the trucks broke down and
the girls on that vehicle were transferred to
another one, the student said. The broken down
truck was set on fire, she added.
When another vehicle broke down and the men
tried to fix it, "some of us jumped out of the
vehicles and ran into the bush. We later found
our way back to Chibok," she said.
Boko Haram, which translates as "western
education is sin," is known to have carried out
deadly attacks on other schools in the northeast.
In a clip released by the group March 23, leader
Abubakar Shekau threatened to launch raids and
abduct girls from schools.
In early March, Borno state government closed
all of its 85 secondary schools and sent more
than 120,000 students home following increasing
Boko Haram attacks on schools.
0 comments:
Post a Comment