ABUJA, Nigeria — Armed assailants stormed a school in Borno state, abducting students who were sitting for secondary exams, police reported on Monday.
The assault occurred Monday morning at Lassa Day Secondary School in the Askira‑Uba district of Borno. Police spokesperson Nahum Daso told The Associated Press that, several hours later, ten individuals had been rescued.
Secondary‑school pupils in Nigeria are generally aged between 15 and 18.
No organisation has yet claimed responsibility, although the long‑running insurgency in the area has caused thousands of deaths and displaced millions.
“At this stage we do not know how many students were taken, but roughly ten victims have been freed,” Daso said, without providing casualty figures.
Amnesty International Nigeria reported that two teachers and one student were killed in the assault.
“Schools ought to be sanctuaries, and no child should be forced to choose between education and survival,” the group said in a statement on its social‑media channels.
“Safeguarding children’s lives is essential, and the Nigerian government must act to keep the nation’s education system from being further endangered by armed groups roaming northern Nigeria.”
Boko Haram and its offshoot, which pledges allegiance to the Islamic State and is known as Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP), remain dominant militant forces in northeastern Nigeria and the wider Lake Chad region, bordering Chad, Niger and Cameroon.
Earlier this month, Nigerian troops freed over 300 people who had been kidnapped by Boko Haram in Ngoshe, a town roughly 114 kilometres (71 miles) from Lassa, the site of Monday’s abduction.
In May, Nigeria announced that a combined operation with the United States had eliminated 175 ISWAP combatants.
The United Nations reports that the insurgency in Nigeria’s northeast has claimed thousands of lives and displaced millions.