Kidnappings for ransom have become increasingly common in Imo state. Members of the clergy are frequent targets.

A group with alleged ties to the "Islamic State" has "enslaved and sexually abused" hundreds of women and girls in Mozambique over the past three years, Human Rights Watch said.

Suspected bandits in the early hours of Tuesday attacked the staff quarters of the University of Abuja, abducting four staff of the institution along with their children.

Officials in Nigeria have said the students were freed with the help of several of their captors who had been pressured by a military crackdown to work with authorities.

The attack on a remote village in the northwest of the country comes days after bandits released 90 pupils they had held captive. Police are searching for the perpetrators of the latest crime.

The suspected members of Iranian intelligence allegedly planned to "forcibly take" a US journalist and human rights activist from New York to Iran.

The chief of Kajuru, Alhaji Alhassan Adamu, and 10 family members have been kidnapped. Police have deployed rescue operations in Kaduna state.

Yusuf Lado had not yet learned to read or write when his school closed for fear of attacks by armed gangs, which have been snatching students across northwest Nigeria in hopes of lucrative ransom payouts. The 7-year-old has now set aside his dream of becoming a doctor and is training to be a welder, despite his slight build.

A school official said unidentified gunmen seized more than 100 children from a school in Kaduna, a provincial capital in northwest Nigeria.

Gunmen kidnap staff and baby from northwest Nigerian hospital

Armed attackers have abducted at least 80 pupils and five teachers from a school in the state of Kebbi. Security forces are searching for the kidnapped students and staff.

Nigerian authorities said on Tuesday that about 200 children had been seized in the latest school kidnapping in its violent north but they ruled out securing their freedom by paying a ransom.