Gunmen abducted 303 schoolchildren and 12 teachers from St. Mary’s School, a Catholic school in Niger State, according to a revised tally issued by the Christian Association of Nigeria. The update followed a verification process after authorities first reported 215 abducted students, with officials adding that 88 more children were captured while trying to escape.
The victims, boys and girls ages 10 to 18, were taken just days after 25 students were kidnapped in a similar attack in neighboring Kebbi State. No group has claimed responsibility. The abduction comes amid ongoing nationwide school kidnappings, limited early warning systems, and renewed attention on Nigeria as attacks continue against Christian communities.
Since 2009, approximately 185,009 Nigerians have been killed, including 125,009 Christians and 60,000 “liberal Muslims.” The numbers clearly show that Christians are being disproportionately targeted.
A report by the Catholic-inspired group Intersociety says at least 7,087 Christians were massacred in Nigeria in the first 220 days of 2025, an average of 32 per day, with 7,899 others abducted by roughly 22 jihadist groups. The report claims these groups aim to eliminate more than 100 million Christians and to wipe out Christianity in Nigeria within 50 years, noting that since 2009 they have killed 125,009 Christians, destroyed 19,100 churches, displaced over 1,100 Christian communities, and abducted more than 600 clerics.
Benue State has suffered the worst of the violence, including the Yelewata massacre that killed an estimated 280 Christians between June 13 and 14, 2025, in the village of Yelwata. Another atrocity, the Sankera massacre, took place in April 2025 in the Sankera axis of Benue State, where more than 72 defenseless Christians were hacked to death. Church leaders describe these killings as systematic and escalating, and they accuse elements of the Nigerian military and political leadership of enabling jihadist violence while ignoring repeated pleas for protection.
In addition to the killings, the pattern of mass kidnappings in Nigeria is disturbing and has an extensive history. One of the most infamous cases occurred on April 14, 2014, when Boko Haram abducted 276 schoolgirls from the Government Secondary School in Chibok, Borno State. Fifty-seven girls escaped immediately by jumping from the trucks as they were being transported. As of April 2024, ten years later, eighty-two of the Chibok girls were still missing and are presumed to remain in captivity, and roughly a third of the missing girls are believed to have died.
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