The Papiri kidnapping occurred on 21 November 2025 when unidentified gunmen abducted 315 Nigerian Catholics from St Mary's School in Papiri, Niger State, Nigeria. The victims included 303 students and 12 teachers. Police in Nigeria’s northwestern Zamfara state on Thursday confirmed that at least 68 children remain missing from a school after unknown assailants assaulted the school and abducted them. Police claimed they managed to rescue five girls in the incident. Innovating against insecurity: Ending Nigeria’s kidnapping economy and safeguarding our children’s futures.Nigeria in emergency: mass kidnappings target schools and Churches. Nigeria's minister of police affairs, Adamu Maina Waziri, says negotiations are underway with the childrens' kidnappers and that security forces are rolling out new strategies to curb what he calls the "pervasive" problem of kidnapping in the country. Kidnappers in Nigeria have killed at least 35 people they abducted from a village in northern Zamfara state despite ransoms being paid for their release, a local official told the BBC. Niger state, which borders Nigeria’s capital Abuja, has experienced repeated kidnappings for ransom by armed groups, including mass abductions, in recent years. Najume reported that about 300 gunmen arrived on motorbikes and stayed for several hours... The seizure of more than 300 boys brought immediate comparisons to the 2014 kidnapping of hundreds of schoolgirls. But an anguishing six days later, a state governor said the boys had been released.