Officials said a search was underway for the students, who were taken from their dormitory during the overnight hours. A motive for the attack was unclear.

Gunmen attacked a government girls’ boarding school in Nigeria’s Kebbi State early on Monday, killing the vice principal and abducting 25 female students, police said, in the latest mass kidnapping in the country’s northwest.

Steven Hamilton, 53, will spend half of his two-year sentence in prison after the incident at Holywood train station earlier this year.

President Trump earlier this month asserted that Christianity faces an "existential threat" in Nigeria​ and told the Pentagon to begin preparing for possible military action.