Gunmen seize dozens in Nigeria's Kaduna state

Gunmen in Nigeria have kidnapped 61 people from a village in northern Kaduna state, days after nearly 300 students went missing in an attack by an armed gang, residents said.

Gunmen attacked the Buda community around midnight on Monday, firing sporadically, a tactic used to scare, residents said.

The kidnappings of ten happened in remote communities, leaving residents helpless.

Resident Lawal Abdullahi said on Tuesday he was away when the gunmen struck, but his wife was among those taken.

"My wife is among the 61 people those bandits kidnapped. We are still expecting them to call for ransom as usual," Abdullahi told the Reuters news agency by phone.

State lawmaker Usman Danlami Stingo told Arise News that 32 women and 29 men had been snatched.

Buda is 160 km from Kuriga town, where schoolchildren were seized last week. Kaduna's internal security commissioner and police spokesperson did not respond to requests for comment.

"We have been experiencing these attacks for a long time. The situation has become worse, forcing many residents and farmers from villages to flee to less dangerous places," another resident, Danjuma Sale, said.

Years of terror

Officials say troops are searching forests in the northwest to rescue the Kuriga students, but families say little detail has emerged since the abductions.

The mass kidnapping in Kaduna State and another in the northeast a week before came almost ten years after Boko Haram militants triggered a huge international outcry in 2014 by abducting more than 250 schoolgirls from Chibok in Borno state.

Armed groups, known locally as bandits, have wreaked havoc for years in northern Nigeria, where they target villagers, motorists on highways and students from schools for ransom.