Quick Summary
Gunmen abducted 303 students and 12 teachers and staff from St. Mary’s Catholic School in Niger State; 50 students have since escaped.
Since 2014, at least 17 mass abductions have occurred, with at least 1,700 children seized from schools in Nigeria.
More than 100,000 Nigerians have died in political and religious violence since 2011, according to the Council on Foreign Relations.
The mass kidnapping of children in Nigeria caught the world’s attention over a decade ago when 276 high-school students were abducted from Chibok, sparking the #BringBackOurGirls campaign on social media. The phenomenon returned to the limelight this month with another mass abduction and President Trump’s threats to intervene over what he said was the persecution of Christians in one of Africa’s most strategic nations.