Victims are often released shortly after negotiations though officials always deny any ransom payments. The gangs are largely driven by financial motives and have no known ideological leanings. The area is notorious for banditry and armed robbery, especially along the highway linking the city with the airport. ![]() "It was only when we came out for the morning prayers in the mosque that we learnt it was gunmen who took away students from the college," he said. "We kept hearing gunshots which we ignored as shooting drills from the Nigeria Defence Academy which is a stone-throw from the forestry college," said Mustapha Aliyu, who lives in the area. Residents near the Kaduna college also heard repeated gunshots in the area late on Thursday. Mass kidnappings in the northwest are complicating security challenges facing President Muhammadu Buhari's security forces who are also battling a more than decade-long Islamist insurgency in the northeast. The bandits have recently turned their focus to schools where they kidnap students or schoolchildren for ransom - Thursday's was at least the fourth such attack since December. Heavily-armed gangs in northwest and central Nigeria have stepped up attacks in recent years, kidnapping for ransom, raping and pillaging. "It is unacceptable for parents to send their children to school only to be kidnapped by criminal elements," said Denis John, who said his brother was among those taken. "I appeal to the government to help rescue our children." "We have confirmed from her colleagues our daughter Sera is with the abductors," Helen Sunday told reporters, tears rolling down her face. Government officials said the students were found to be missing after a headcount at the college, and parents said they had been taken by the gunmen. ![]() Police and military personnel stood guard around the college at the outskirts of Kaduna city on Friday afternoon as anxious parents and families waited for news. ![]() The commissioner said some of the rescued students were injured during the operation and were being treated at a military hospital. He had initially said 30 students were unaccounted for.Īruwan said the state government "is maintaining close communication with the management of the college as efforts are sustained by security agencies towards the tracking of the missing students." indicate that 39 students are currently unaccounted for," including 23 females and 16 males, Aruwan said in a statement late Friday. "Further checks in the wake of the attack by armed bandits.
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