- Reveals exact figure of abducted students
The leader of Boko Haram, the Islamist extremist group that abducted hundreds of schoolgirls in Nigeria six years ago, has claimed responsibility for the mass abduction of students in north-western Katsina state last week.
Recall that a large group of men armed with AK-47s overran the all-boys Government Science secondary school in the town of Kankara on Friday night, marching more than 300 students into surrounding forests.
In an audio tape released yesterday, its leader, Abubakar Shekau, said: Our brothers were behind the abduction in Katsina. This conflicts with earlier descriptions of the abductors as bandits by government officials.
Sources within the insurgent group informed that the reason for the 72-hour delay in claiming responsibility for the attack was that they were trying to first ensure they had secured the schoolboys.
Reacting to the lack of clarity concerning the number of schoolboys abducted from a Katsina secondary school last Friday, Boko Haram however disclosed that it currently has 523 children in captivity. Prior to this, there had been at least five conflicting figures in the press.
However, there is doubt over the direct involvement of Boko Haram in the latest mass abduction, as Shekaus statement lacked detail, and officials in Katsina have claimed to have already received ransom demands from a group of bandits that witnesses said were responsible.
One western official working in counter-terrorism in the region said it was possible bandits may have transferred some or all of the kidnapped schoolboys to the extremists in return for money, weapons or other resources.
