Violent kidnappings-for-ransom spread across Nigeria

"One of them ran towards my car" as Magami was stuck, the road blocked."I just sat there and raised my hands, begging them," he recounted.

This is nearly half the 685 kidnappings countrywide in the first quarter of the year -- an average of seven per day.In Nigeria, kidnappings for ransom have been a risk in the oil-rich south for decades. Armed kidnappers called Magami's family daily, demanding huge ransoms. His family -- traders and farmers -- struggled to get together the 440,000 naira to pay the captors.

And while they previously targeted"relatively well-to-do and high net-worth individuals", today"abductions are increasingly indiscriminate and everyone, rich or poor, is at risk," said Obasi. Targeted operations within the last week have led to the arrest of 93 suspected kidnappers across northern Nigeria, with dozens of automatic weapons confiscated, police told reporters Thursday.

Bandit gangs have become common in the rural northwest, stealing cattle, destroying property -- and kidnapping people for ransom.The northwest has become a focal point where many security challenges overlap, agreed Sambo Junaidu, a top minister of the Sultan of Sokoto, the most important Islamic monarch in Nigeria.

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