Nigerian Schoolgirls Abducted: United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Friday demanded the immediate release of several hundred schoolgirls kidnapped by heavily armed men from a state-run school in Zamfara State, northwest Nigeria.
As reported by CNN, the schoolgirls were abducted from their hostels by armed men who barged the Government Girls Secondary School in the town of Jangebe. A confidential source informed that a police officer was also killed in the said attack.
As per reports, about 500 students were at the boarding school, of which around 315 were kidnapped by the gunmen who marched on about 20 motorcycles and took the abducted girls into the forest. Zamfara police informed they had begun search-and-rescue operations with the army to search the "bandits" who kidnapped the girls. Zamfara police commissioner Abutu Yaro revealed that according to a piece of information, the schoolgirls were moved to a neighbouring forest, and the police are tracking them.
UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) representative Peter Hawkins urged the assailants to release the schoolgirls immediately. In his statement, Hawkins said that this mass abduction is a gross violation of human rights and yet another brutal attack on schoolchildren in Nigeria that can have long-lasting effects on the children's mental health and well-being. Volkan Bozkir, president of the 75th session of the UN General Assembly tweeted that he was 'shocked' by the mass kidnapping of schoolgirls.
Nigeria has witnessed three school attacks in less than three months, which revives the series of traumatic memories of the "Chibok girls" kidnapped by jihadists almost seven years ago. The latest mass kidnapping comes barely two weeks after at least 42 people, including students, were kidnapped in a similar attack on a state school in Niger, in Nigeria's Middle Belt region. While a student was killed in that attack, 27 other students, three teachers, and nine family members were kidnapped. However, their current whereabouts are still unknown.
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