Four years on from the mass abduction of more than 200 girls in Chibok, Nigeria, more than 100 girls are now missing after an attack in Dapchi by suspected members of Boko Haram.
As The Washington Post reports, the Government Girls Science and Technical School was attacked on Monday, with residents saying militants in 12 trucks with mounted machine guns drove onto the campus.
While many of the 906 pupils at the school managed to escape into the surrounding bush amidst the gunfire, 110 girls remain unaccounted for.
According to the ABC, it is feared that the students were taken as brides for Boko Haram extremists.
“The Federal Government has confirmed that 110 students of the Government Science and Technical College in Dapchi, Yobe State, are so far unaccounted for, after insurgents believed to be from a faction of Boko Haram invaded their school on Monday”, the information ministry said in a statement.
President Muhammadu Buhari apologised to the students’ families, declaring on Friday: “This is a national disaster. We are sorry that this could have happened.”
The name Boko Haram translates as “western education is forbidden”; in the past, the Nigerian government has claimed that the militant jihadist group had been defeated.
