A group of gunmen on Monday kidnapped an unknown number of primary-school students and six teachers Monday in Birnin Gwari, Nigeria, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing government officials. Family members interviewed by the Journal said the gunmen arrived shortly after the school gates were opened. “They came to the village looking like normal people and one of them drew a gun from his caftan and started firing before moving to the school,” the older brother of one of the abducted teachers told the news outlet. “They picked children and drove them away on motorcycles.” It is the fifth mass school abduction in Nigeria’s northwest since December, and comes just four days after 39 students were kidnapped from an agriculture college in the same area, later appearing in a hostage video surrounded by masked men armed with Kalashnikov rifles.
