…As Scores of migrants found abandoned in freight trailer near US-Mexico border***
More than 100 girls are missing after a Boko Haram attack on a school in Dapchi, Yobe State, earlier this week, parents told AFP on Friday.
Parents in Dapchi, in Yobe State, said they had set up a support group after Monday’s raid, which has revived memories of the 2014 abduction of more than 200 girls in Chibok.
“Our first step was to compile a comprehensive list of all the missing girls. So far, we have compiled the names of 105,” said Bashir Manzo, the chairman of the newly-created group.
Heavily armed jihadists stormed the boarding school in the remote town, forcing terrified students to flee into the surrounding bush.
But with many girls failing to return home, fears are growing that dozens of the girls have been kidnapped.
Hopes were raised on Wednesday evening, when the spokesman for Yobe state governor Ibrahim Gaidam confirmed the abduction and said “some” of the girls had been rescued.
But Gaidam on Thursday questioned whether there had been an abduction, while his spokesman apologised and said they had been “misled” for publishing inaccurate information.
Manzo, whose 16-year-old daughter, Fatima, is among the missing, said the schoolgirls’ mothers and fathers would seek a meeting with Gaidam.
“We believe he was misinformed. The school authorities from the beginning denied and kept denying that our daughters were taken,” he added.
“We will see the governor and seek his help, as well as anyone who matters that can in one way or another assist in ensuring the freedom of our girls.”
Meanwhile, more than 100 migrants from Central America were found in a freight trailer abandoned by a roadside near the U.S.-Mexico border, agents from Mexico’s National Immigration Institute said Friday.
Passing military patrol personnel heard people pounding on the inside walls of the truck and calling for help.
The container had apparently been abandoned by migrant traffickers when the soldiers came across it in Tamaulipas, where migrants frequently attempt illegal border crossings, Reuters reported.
Thousands of Central Americans each year, fleeing violence and poverty, are transported by human traffickers in treacherous, sometimes life-threatening conditions, the report said. The migrants use Mexico as a channel to the U.S.
The rescued migrants, who crammed together for about 12 hours, included 91 Hondurans, seven Guatemalans and five Salvadorans. Among them were 24 youths and 12 unaccompanied minors who were turned over to child welfare authorities.
The migrants were also suffering from dehydration and asphyxiation, Reuters reported.
Subsequently, President Donald Trump called on the Mexican government Friday to block MS-13 gang members from traveling through Mexico to the U.S.
More than 800 Central American migrants have been found in truck trailers or safe house in Mexico this year, Reuters reported, citing from a government document.
In July 2017, 10 people died after a truck carrying more than 100 Guatemalan and Mexican migrants was left in the parking lot of a Walmart store in San Antonio, Texas.
Citizen with additional report from Fox News
