Officials confirm 136 students abducted from Nigeria school
Lagos, Jun 3: Authorities have confirmed that 136 students were abducted by gunmen in northern Nigeria earlier this week, including some as young as 5 years old, the school's owner said Thursday.
Gunmen on motorcycles targeted Salihu Tanko Islamic School on Sunday, killing one person and abducting three teachers as well, school owner Umar Idris told The Associated Press.
Idris said the number could be higher, though, because school officials have not been able to reach all of the parents to confirm whether their children are back home.
We have sent out a message asking parents who have not yet reported to the school to do so, Idris said, adding that three teachers also were kidnapped.
Other preschoolers were left behind as they could not keep pace when the gunmen hurriedly moved those abducted into the forest.
The 11 children were mainly aged between 3 and 4 and they lacked the stamina to keep pace with the gunmen, so they were abandoned on the way, Idris said, adding that the preschoolers were found hours after the attack.
The school's pupils range in age between 3 and 14, and parents are concerned that some of the youngest kidnapping victims may be unable to survive in the forest.
Gunmen have abducted hundreds of students in northern Nigeria this year, and the government has been unable to halt the spate of abductions for ransom. As a result, many schools have been forced to close due to the concerns about the kidnapping risk.
Earlier this week, 14 students and staff from Greenfield University in Kaduna state were released after spending more than a month in captivity. The gunmen who demanded hundreds of thousands of dollars in ransom had earlier killed five other students to compel the students' parents to raise the money.
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Two injuries, one DNF, a DQ as India end messy World Relays campaign
Gaborone (Botswana) (PTI): Amoj Jacob and Ragul Kumar got injured during the men's 4x400m and 4x100 races respectively as India ended their World Athletics Relays campaign in disappointment on the second day of competitions here on Sunday.
The Indian camp had high hopes of making the 2027 World Championships in the men's 4x400m relay but the team did not finish (DNF) the race as Jacob suffered cramps and pulled out of the race after taking the baton from the first leg runner Dharamveer Choudhary. Rajesh Ramesh and Vishal TK were to run in the third and fourth legs.
Those teams which could not qualify for the 2027 Beijing World Championships by reaching the final round of each of the six relay events on Saturday were given another chance in the second qualification round on Sunday.
The top two teams in each of the two heats (in all six relay events) booked the Beijing ticket on Sunday.
India will now have to try and qualify for the World Championships through the Top Lists of the World Athletics, which is a long and tedious process.
In the men's 4x100m race, third leg runner Ragul Kumar fell down the track after failing to hand over the baton inside the exchange zone to fourth leg runner Gurindervir Singh, which clearly showed the lack of coordination among the runners.
Harsh Santosh Raut and Animesh Kujur ran the first two legs.
The Indian quartet was disqualified and Kumar was seen being taken away from the Field of Play with the help of the volunteers.
It was a comedy of errors in the case of the women's 4x100m race, which saw the baton being dropped during an exchange between first leg runner Tamanna and second runner Nithya Gandhe, though the Indians finished the race in 53.09 seconds.
Gandhe started running quite a distance, but after realising that the baton was not in her hand, she turned and ran back to pick it up.
The only silver-lining for the Indian contingent was the national record time in the mixed 4x100m relay race, though the quartet of Ragul Kumar, Nithya Gandhe, Animesh Kujur and Sneha SS finished sixth in heat number two with a time of 41.35 seconds, bettering the previous national mark of 42.30 seconds set in March in Chandigarh.
The mixed 4x400m relay quartet of Theerthesh P Shetty, Kumari Saloni, Nihal William and Rashdeep Kaur ended at fifth in heat number one with a time of 3 minutes and 19.40 seconds.
On Saturday, all the five Indian relay teams had failed to make it to the respective final rounds and thus missed out on the 2027 World Championships berths.
