Armed men believed to belong to a criminal gang kidnapped hundreds of students from their hostels along with some teachers in central Nigeria, an official and a security source told Agence France-Presse on Wednesday.
The attackers, wearing military uniforms, stormed the Government Science School in “large numbers” in the city of Kagara, in the state of Niger, on Tuesday night, driving students into a nearby forest, the sources said.
The state governor’s spokesman told Reuters the facility involved was a high school.
A student was killed during the kidnapping, the officer said.
Northwest and central Nigeria have been increasingly targeted by criminal gangs known locally as “bandits” who kidnap for ransom, rape and loot across the region.
“Bandits entered GSC Kagara last night and kidnapped hundreds of students and their teachers,” said an official who asked not to be named due to the delicacy of the matter.
“One of the kidnapped employees and some students managed to escape. The team confirmed that a student was shot dead during the kidnapping operation,” said the officer.
The school has about 1,000 students, but it was not clear how many were taken.
The security source confirmed the details of the attack and said an employee count was underway.
Troops with air support track the bandits for possible rescue, the security source said.
The kidnapping in Niger came two months after hundreds of students were kidnapped in the northwestern state of Katsina, which were released days later, after negotiations with the government.
The gangs, driven by financial reasons, have no ideological tendencies, but security officials fear they are being infiltrated by jihadists from northeastern Nigeria, where the army is fighting a decade-long Islamic insurgency.