Troops of the Nigerian Army deployed in the North-East have announced the rescue of Lydia Simon, a Chibok girl who had been held captive by Boko Haram terrorists for several years.

A statement from the Department of Army Public Relations said Lydia, who was on serial number 68 among the abducted missing Chibok Secondary School girls, was rescued along with her three children by troops conducting Operation Desert Sanity III, around Ngoshe in the Gwoza Local Government Area of Borno State.

Lydia is five months pregnant at the time of her rescue and claimed to be from Pemi Town in Chibok.

The statement added that Nigerian Army troops deployed for Counter- terrorism Counter- insurgency operations in the North Central on Tuesday, April 16, 2024 successfully ambushed and neutralised three terrorists, who were on a mission to wreak havoc.

According to statistics released by parents of the abducted schoolgirls, 271 students were kidnapped on that unfortunate day but 57 girls escaped shortly in 2014, 103 were released through the intervention of the Federal Government, 20 others freed by the efforts of the state government but 92 students are still in captivity.

There had been many mass kidnapping of schoolchildren since the Chibok incident, attracting global outrage. From Chibok to Dapchi, Kankara, Kagara, and many others, terrorists have in the last one decade seized thousands of schoolchildren in mass kidnappings. While some of the students eventually regains freedom, others have been perpetually detained in the enclaves of their abductors and sexual abusers.