50 children kidnapped from Nigerian Catholic school escape captivity

Gunmen on Friday raided St Mary's co-education school in Niger state, taking 303 children and 12 teachers in one of the largest mass kidnappings in Nigeria.

The abduction came days after gunmen stormed a secondary school in neighbouring Kebbi state, abducting 25 girls.

"We have received some good news as fifty pupils escaped and have reunited with their parents," said the Christian Association of Nigeria in a statement, adding they escaped between Friday and Saturday.

The number of boys and girls - aged between eight and 18 years - kidnapped from St Mary's is almost half of the school's student population of over 600.

There remain 251 primary school pupils, 14 secondary students and 12 teachers still in captivity, the statement said.

The Nigerian government has yet to comment on the number of students and teachers abducted.

"As much as we receive the return of these 50 children that escaped with some sigh of relief, I urge you all to continue in your prayers for the rescue and safe return of the remaining victims," CAN chairman in Niger State, Reverend Bulus Dauwa Yohanna, who is also the school owner, said in the statement.

Mounting security fears in Africa's most populous nation have sparked a wave of school closures across the country.

Since Islamist militants kidnapped nearly 300 schoolgirls from Chibok town more than a decade ago, Nigeria has struggled with a spate of mass kidnappings, mostly carried out by criminal gangs looking for ransom payments.

Gunmen often attack remote boarding schools where they know a lack of security presence will make for soft targets. Most victims are released after negotiations.

- 'Deep sorrow' -

Pope Leo XIV on Sunday made "a heartfelt appeal for the immediate release of the hostages".

He expressed his "deep sorrow, especially for the many young boys and girls kidnapped and for their anguished families," at the end of the Angelus prayer.

The two abduction operations and an attack on a church in the west of the country, in which two people were killed and dozens abducted, came as US President Donald Trump threatened military action over what he called the persecution of Christians by radical Islamists in Nigeria.

When asked about the recent attacks and kidnappings on Fox News Radio, Trump said "what's happening in Nigeria is a disgrace".

The local Catholic diocese said in a statement late Saturday that the school "attackers operated aggressively and without interruption for nearly three hours, moving through dormitories".

Nearly a week after their capture, two dozen school girls in neighbouring Kebbi state are still missing.

Security forces have identified locations where they are thought to be held, according to a security source. Only one of the 25 girls managed to escape early in the week.

Nigeria is also dealing with a deadly Islamist insurgency in the northeast of the country, where the violence has killed more than 40,000 people and displaced around two million since it erupted in 2019.

Ayesha Yesufu, co-founder of the #BringBackOurGirls group movement which led the campaign for the release of the Chibok schoolgirls kidnapped by Boko Haram 11 years ago, said kidnappings continues because "authorities are doing nothing" to curb the crisis.

"They're more interested in the propaganda of...not looking inept and incompetent, rather than actually being interested in the protection of rights and properties," she told AFP.

Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the Nigerian chief of World Trade Organization, posted on X that "As a mother I am greatly saddened by the kidnappings in our country particularly of our children and teachers from places of learning."