Nigeria opens door for talks with kidnappers

Associated Press

ABUJA, Nigeria

U.S. reconnaissance aircraft flew over Nigeria in search of the nearly 300 kidnapped schoolgirls Tuesday, a day after the Boko Haram militant group released the first evidence that at least some of them are still alive and demanded that jailed fighters be swapped for their freedom.

A Nigerian government official said “all options” were open — including negotiations or a possible military operation with foreign help — in the effort to free the girls, who were shown fearful and huddled together dressed in gray Islamic veils as they sang Quranic verses under the guns of their captors in a video released Monday.

The footage was verified as authentic by Nigerian authorities, who said 54 of the girls had been identified by relatives, teachers and classmates who watched the video late Tuesday.

The abduction has spurred a global movement to secure the girls’ release amid fears they would be sold into slavery, married off to fighters or worse after a series of threats by Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau.

Protesters marched through the streets of the capital, Abuja, on Tuesday to demand more government action to find and free the girls, who are believed to be held in the vast Sambisi forest some 20 miles from the eastern town of Chibok, where they were seized from their school April 15.

A U.S. reconnaisance mission was being carried out by a manned MC-12 surveillance aircraft, which is based in Niger, according to senior U.S. defense officials in Washington. In addition to the turboprop model, which has seen heavy use in Afghanistan, U.S. officials also were considering the use of drones.