Gunmen abduct students sitting exams in northeast Nigeria

MAIDUGURI, Nigeria, June 29 - Gunmen burst into a school in northeastern Nigeria and abducted students as they were sitting exams on Monday morning, police said.

The attackers fired sporadically as they charged into Government Day Secondary School in the town of Lassa, Borno State police spokesperson ASP Nahum Kenneth Daso said.

Borno is the epicentre of an Islamist insurgency where criminal groups have also seized people for ransom.

The military, police and other agencies were searching nearby forests to try and rescue the students who had been sitting their National Examinations Council exams, Daso said. The test is typically taken by 16- and 17-year-olds.

Officials were still trying to work out how many students were missing, as some remained unaccounted for following the attack that started around 9 a.m. (0800 GMT), Daso said.

Nigeria is grappling with overlapping security crises that stretch far beyond the jihadist insurgency in the northeast, where Boko Haram and Islamic State West Africa Province have waged a conflict for more than 15 years.

In the northwest, heavily armed gangs known locally as bandits carry out mass kidnappings for ransom and raids on villages and schools, while north-central states have also seen recurring violence linked to disputes over land and grazing routes. REUTERS