One hundred children kidnapped from a Catholic boarding school in central Nigeria last month have been released by their captors and transported to the capital, authorities confirmed Sunday. The fate of more than 160 other students and staff members abducted in the same attack remains unknown.
The mass abduction occurred before dawn on Nov. 21, when armed men stormed St. Mary’s Catholic Primary and Secondary School in Papiri, Niger State, and seized 315 students and staff, most of them children aged between 9 and 14, at gunpoint.
On Sunday, Nigerian presidential spokesperson Sunday Dare confirmed 100 of the children had been freed, according to Agence France-Presse. They were flown to Abuja and were expected to be handed over to the Niger State government on Monday.
A United Nations source told AFP that arrangements were being made to transfer the children back to state officials. Reports did not specify whether the release was achieved through negotiation, ransom or military intervention, and no information was available on the condition or location of the remaining hostages.
Local church officials said they had not yet received formal notification from the federal government.
“We have been praying and waiting for their return, if it is true then it is a cheering news,” Daniel Atori, spokesman for Bishop Bulus Yohanna of the Kontagora Diocese, which runs the school, was quoted as saying.
Roughly 50 individuals managed to escape shortly after the attack.
Officials later estimated that 265 hostages had been taken deep into the forests of north-central Nigeria, where kidnapping for ransom has become widespread.
The attack on St. Mary’s was one of several mass abductions reported across Nigeria in November, a month that saw a sharp escalation in armed violence, including the kidnapping of at least two dozen Muslim schoolgirls, 38 church worshippers and multiple attacks on civilians in rural communities.
Three days after the Papiri abduction, Anthony Musa, a father of three of the abducted children, died of a suspected heart attack attributed to the emotional toll of the ordeal.
Nigeria has struggled to contain the growing threat posed by various armed factions, including jihadist insurgents, criminal gangs and militias. The country’s kidnap-for-ransom crisis has evolved into a structured illicit industry, generating at least $1.66 million between July 2024 and June 2025, according to a report from Lagos-based SBM Intelligence.
In response to the security crisis, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu announced a broad expansion of Nigeria’s security forces in late November. He ordered the recruitment of 20,000 new police officers in addition to the 30,000 previously approved, and authorised the hiring of forest guards under the Department of State Services.
The Nigerian Senate held an emergency debate during which lawmakers labelled kidnapping a form of terrorism and proposed capital punishment for offenders. Several senators raised alarms over infiltration of the military and police, citing lists of security force recruits containing names of known militants.
Rights groups and analysts say a mixture of jihadist actors, bandit gangs and armed Fulani herders are behind the surge in attacks.
The World Watch List 2025 report from Open Doors noted that 3,100 of the 4,476 Christians reportedly killed for their faith globally during the review period were in Nigeria.
A newly active group known as Lakurawa, believed to be linked to al-Qaeda’s West African affiliate JNIM, has emerged in the northwest. The group is reportedly armed with advanced weaponry and espouses a radical Islamist ideology.
In one of the most widely reported incidents last month, Rev. Edwin Achi of the Anglican Diocese of Kaduna was confirmed dead on Nov. 19, nearly a month after being abducted alongside his wife from their home in Nissi, Kaduna State. A ransom demand of 600 million naira, or about $415,000, had been made by the captors. His wife, Sarah, remains in captivity, and their daughter is also missing.
U.S. President Donald Trump has accused Nigerian authorities of allowing violence against Christians in the country, warning of possible military intervention. The Nigerian government has long pushed back on claims that violence in the country is religiously motivated, but has faced criticism from rights activists that it is failing to protect its citizens from armed actors.
One of the earliest abduction cases to draw international attention occurred in 2014, when Boko Haram abducted nearly 300 schoolgirls from Chibok, sparking global outrage. Many of those girls remain missing, and the incident continues to haunt public memory as armed groups carry out copycat kidnappings nearly a decade later.
The current wave of abductions has prompted stepped-up surveillance by U.S. aircraft over known jihadist strongholds in Nigeria’s north, according to security analysts tracking regional flight paths.
A local official in Borno State told AFP that armed groups may be holding captives as a form of insurance, fearing possible U.S. airstrikes in response to recent threats.
