Nigerian Gunmen Kidnap Schoolgirls From Secondary School

[HuffingtonPost]

By Lanre Ola                

MAIDUGURI, Nigeria, April 15 (Reuters) - Suspected Islamist  insurgents have abducted more than 100 female  students in a  night raid on a government secondary school in Nigeria's  northeast Borno state, a teacher said on Tuesday.                

He said gunmen, believed to be members of the Boko Haram  Islamist group which has attacked schools in the northeast  before as part of their anti-government rebellion, carried off  the students from the school in Chibok late on Monday.                

"Over 100 female students in our government secondary school  at Chibok have been abducted," said Audu Musa, who teaches in  another public school in the area, around 140 km (90 miles)  south of the Borno state capital Maiduguri.                

Musa said he saw eight bodies in the area on Tuesday  morning, but did not give the identity of the victims. "Things  are very bad here and everybody is sad," he said.                

The military did not immediately respond to requests for  comment.                

Education Commissioner for Borno State Inuwa Kubo confirmed  the incident at Chibok, but told Reuters by phone authorities  were still trying to ascertain the exact number of girls  abducted, as several students fled into the bush in the darkness  during the attack.                

Borno state's education authorities had last month ordered  all of its schools closed to protect children after Islamists  killed dozens of pupils in a February attack against a boarding  school in neighboring Yobe state.                

But a Borno education official, who asked not to be named,  said the female students had been back at the Chibok school  writing exams.                

Boko Haram, which in the Hausa language means broadly  "Western education is sinful", says it wants to carve out a  separate Islamic state in Nigeria and has targeted schools, as  well as Christian churches and police and government offices, in  its violent insurrection against the Nigerian state.                

The raid on the school followed a bomb blast on Monday at a  crowded bus station on the outskirts of the Nigerian capital  Abuja, which killed more than 70 people. President Goodluck  Jonathan said he suspected Boko Haram was behind the bombing.        (Additional reporting by Chijioke Ohuocha in Lagos; Writing by  Pascal Fletcher; Editing by Joe Brock)
Source: huffingtonpost.com