100 kidnapped Nigerian schoolchildren released: UN source, presidency

Agence France-Presse·8 December 2025, 4:47 am·1 min read

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100 kidnapped Nigerian schoolchildren released: UN source, presidency — NIGERIA-UNREST-KIDNAPPING-SCHOOL A pair of shoes is seen inside a student dormitory at St. Mary’s Catholic School in Papiri, Agwarra local government, Niger state, on November 23, 2025. Fifty of the more than 300 children snatched by gunmen from a Catholic school in Nigeria have escaped their captors, a Christian group said in a statement on November 23. "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 November 21 and 22. Gunmen raided early November 21 St Mary's co-education school in Niger state in western Nigeria, taking 303 children and 12 teachers in one of the largest mass kidnappings in Nigeria. Ifeanyi Immanuel Bakwenye / AFP

Nigerian authorities have secured the release of 100 kidnapped schoolchildren, a United Nations source and local media said Sunday.

The children from St. Mary's Catholic school in Papiri are set to be handed over to local government officials in Niger state on Monday, according to the source.

The freeing of the 100 children was confirmed to AFP by presidential spokesman Sunday Dare, though the fate of 165 students and staff thought to remain in the kidnappers hands was unclear.