Nigerian leader rules out ransoms for abducted students as observers urge dialogue
Nigeria’s president has urged security agencies not to pay ransoms to rescue nearly 300 schoolchildren abducted from their school in the conflict-hit north a week ago
ABUJA, Nigeria (AP) — Nigeria’s leader has ruled out the payment of ransoms for nearly 300 schoolchildren abducted from their school in the conflict-hit north a week ago, raising questions from analysts on Thursday about how best to rescue the children without hurting them.
Meanwhile, at least two people with extensive knowledge of the security crisis in Nigeria's northwest told The Associated Press the abductors of the schoolchildren in the state of Kaduna are known and are hiding in the vast ungoverned and unoccupied forests of the region. They both urged the government to engage in dialogue with the armed groups to resolve the protracted conflict.
At least 1,400 students have so far been kidnapped from Nigerian schools since the first major school abduction — in Borno state’s Chibok village in 2014 — stunned the world. Most of those eventually released only regained their freedom after ransom payments, according to their schools and parents, even though the Nigerian government does not admit to paying ransoms.
On Wednesday, Nigeria's information minister Mohammed Idris told reporters that President Bola Tinubu directed security agencies to urgently rescue the schoolchildren and "in the process to ensure that not a dime is paid for ransom.”
