Armed men stormed a Catholic school in central Nigeria early Friday morning, November 21, 2025, abducting an unknown number of students and staff. The attack comes just days after another mass kidnapping in the northwest of the country.

🚨 Nighttime attack at St. Mary's School

On Friday, November 21, 2025, St. Mary's School in the Papiri community, located in the Agwara local administration (Niger State), was the target of a violent attack. The assailants stormed the school grounds between 1:00 and 3:00 a.m.

The preliminary assessment is alarming:

1. Several students and staff members were abducted.
2. A security guard was shot dead during the assault, according to security sources.

Abubakar Usman, Secretary of the Government of the State of Niger, confirmed the news with "deep sadness", specifying that "the exact number of students abducted has not yet been confirmed" .

🔗 Abduction Sequence

This kidnapping is part of a series of attacks currently shaking Nigeria:

1. A few days earlier, on the night of Sunday, November 16, to Monday, November 17, 2025, 25 schoolgirls were kidnapped from the girls' boarding school in Maga, Kebbi State (northwest). One of them managed to escape. The kidnappers' identities remain unknown.

Faced with this wave of insecurity, local authorities have reacted by deciding to close schools for an indefinite period in five regions of the north-central region, as a security measure.

📈 A national scourge

Insecurity and mass kidnappings are commonplace in Nigeria. Friday's incident is a painful reminder of the tragic events of 2014 , when Boko Haram jihadists kidnapped nearly 300 schoolgirls in Chibok (Northeast).

The West African giant has been facing a jihadist insurgency for several years, which has caused 40,000 deaths and more than two million displaced people in the north, according to UN figures.