Zürcher Nachrichten - Nigerian government frees 130 kidnapped Catholic schoolchildren

"Another 130 abducted Niger state pupils released, none left in captivity," Sunday Dare said in a post on X.

In late November, hundreds of students and staff were kidnapped from St Mary's co-educational boarding school in north-central Niger state -- though the exact number, and whether all are free, has been in dispute.

The attack came as the country buckled under a wave of mass abductions reminiscent of the infamous 2014 Boko Haram kidnapping of schoolgirls in the town of Chibok.

The west African country suffers from multiple interlinked security concerns, from jihadists in the northeast to armed "bandit" gangs in the northwest.

A UN source told AFP that "the remaining set of girls/secondary school students will be taken to Minna", the capital of Niger state, on Tuesday.

The exact number of those kidnapped, and those who remain in captivity, has been unclear since the attack on the school, located in the rural hamlet of Papiri.

The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) said 315 students and staff were kidnapped.

Some 50 escaped immediately afterward, and on December 7 the government secured the release of around 100.

That would leave about 165 thought to remain in captivity.

A statement from President Bola Tinubu at the time put the remaining people being held at 115.

- Spate of mass kidnappings -

It has not been made public who seized the children from their boarding school, or how the government secured their release.

Analysts have said that based on past rescues, it was likely authorities paid a ransom, which is technically prohibited by law.

Kidnappings for ransom are a common way for criminals and armed groups to make quick cash in Nigeria.

But a spate of mass abductions in November put an uncomfortable spotlight on the country's already grim security situation.

Assailants kidnapped two dozen Muslim schoolgirls, 38 church worshippers and a bride and her bridesmaids -- with farmers, women and children also taken hostage.

The kidnappings came as Nigeria faces a diplomatic offensive from the United States, where President Donald Trump has alleged that there were mass killings of Christians that amounted to a "genocide" and threatened military intervention.

The Nigerian government and independent analysts reject that framing, which has long been used by the Christian right in the United States and Europe.

One of the first mass kidnappings that drew international attention was in 2014, when nearly 300 girls were snatched from their boarding school in the northeastern town of Chibok by Boko Haram jihadists.

A decade later, Nigeria's kidnap-for-ransom crisis has "consolidated into a structured, profit-seeking industry" that raised some $1.66 million between July 2024 and June 2025, according to a recent report by SBM Intelligence, a Lagos-based consultancy.

N.Fischer--NZN