Nigeria: Search Stepped up for 110 Schoolgirls Kidnapped by Boko Haram
Local Editor
Nigeria deployed extra troops and planes to search for 110 schoolgirls believed to have been abducted by Boko Haram terrorists last week.
The girls went missing after terrorists stormed their school in the town of Dapchi in the north-eastern Yobe state on 19 February.
In this regard, Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari considered the incident as a "national disaster" and apologized to the girls' families.
The attack revived memories of the Chibok schoolgirls' abduction in 2014.
Meanwhile, anger has been growing among the girls' parents amid reports that soldiers had been withdrawn from key checkpoints in Dapchi last month.
Dapchi, some 275km north-west of Chibok, came under attack last Monday, causing students and teachers from the Government Girls Science and Technical College to flee into the surrounding bush.
Residents narrated that Nigeria's security forces, backed by military jets, later repelled the attack.
Although authorities initially denied the students had been kidnapped, saying they were hiding from their attackers, they later admitted that 110 girls were missing after the attack.
Boko Haram terrorists have been fighting a long insurgency in the country's north in their quest for a so-called ‘Islamic state' in the region.
Nearly four years ago they abducted 276 girls from a school in Chibok, leading to a worldwide #BringBackOurGirls campaign. The location of more than 100 of those girls is still unknown.
The conflict is estimated to have claimed the lives of tens of thousands of people, and led to the abduction of thousands others.
Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team
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