More than 40 girls flee Boko Haram\'s den after abduction

More than 40 teenage girls had fled the den of abductors in northeast Nigeria, an official said barely a week after the kidnapping. The escapees were received by local authorities and reunited with their families on Friday. Inuwa Kubo, Borno State commissioner for education, told reporters in Chibok Town, place of the incident, located about 141 km to Maiduguri, capital of the province. "With this development, we have 44 out of our 129 students at the hostel on the day of attack on the school. This means that we have 85 students yet to join us," said Kubo, who relocated to the school to assist with free flow of information gathering and dissemination on latest developments. The state official also expressed optimism that other teenage students still in the den of kidnappers would return unhurt. Those who escaped are now in stable condition, he added. According to sources, local hunters had mostly assisted in the successful escape of the teenage girls, who were lost in bushes after escaping from their abductors' den. Military operatives on rescue mission had also launched a manhunt for the kidnappers. Four among a total of 129 teenage students of the Government Girls College in Chibok Town had escaped late Monday after the gunmen attacked their dormitories. The girls escaped after the vehicle of their abductors broke down along the road, state officials said. The gunmen, before gaining entry into the school premises, had killed a military officer on guard and injured many local residents who tried to resist the attack. Last Wednesday, Governor of the northern Borno State Kashim Shettima said 10 other girls had reunited with their families, after plotting their escape from hideout of the gunmen, believed to be members of Boko Haram, a sect which is a major security threat in Africa's most populous country. "I am personally in contact with the principal of the school and district head," said Shettima, at a press conference in Maidguri, while pledging to marshal all the resources at the disposal of the state government to rescue the students still in captive. He described the incident as "sad" and further announced a 50 million naira (308,000 U.S. dollars) bounty "for anybody with credible information on the movement of the attackers." No group has neither claimed responsibility for the abduction nor mentioned a ransom to secure release of the kidnapped teenage students.