More than 300 Nigerian schoolchildren have been released after terrorist group Boko Haram claimed to have abducted them last week, officials said.
Aminu Bello Masari, the governor of Katsina state in northern Nigeria, said on Thursday that a total of 344 boys had been released and were going back to Katsina to be medically examined and reunited with their families the next day. as reported by Reuters.
“We’ve recovered most of the guys,” Masari told the dam. “They’re not all.”
The BBC quoted a security source as telling the AFP news agency that some of the boys were still being held by their captors.
The new release of the boys came hours after Boko Haram militants posted a video that allegedly showed students in an undisclosed location.
The boys were abducted at Kankara Government Science High School on Friday night when men armed with assault rifles attacked their school.
The Islamist militant group has kidnapped schoolchildren in the past, most recently in April 2014, when nearly 300 schoolgirls in Chibok, northeastern Borno state, disappeared. About 100 of these girls have not yet been found.
With mail cables