Over 200 inmates escape from prison following heavy flooding in Nigeria
By Mariya Knight, CNN
(CNN) — At least 274 inmates have escaped from a prison in Nigeria’s Borno state following heavy flooding, the Nigerian Correctional Service said Sunday.
“The flood brought down the walls of the correctional facilities, including the medium security custodial center Maiduguri (MSCC) as well as the staff quarters in the city,” the service spokesman Abubakar Umar said in a statement.
According to Umar, at least 281 inmates managed to escape while they were being transferred to “a safe and secure facility” and seven of them were recaptured later.
Umar said that the service was aware of escapees’ identities, including their biometrics, and had made this information “available to the public.”
The search for the inmates was ongoing, he said.
Weeks of flooding across Nigeria have led to 229 deaths and displaced more than 386,000 people, according to the latest data from the country’s disaster management agency NEMA, shared with CNN.
Northern Nigeria has been the most affected by the floods, the data showed. Borno state is in the northeast of the country.
Last month, the Nigeria Hydrological Services Agency (NIHSA) also warned of the rising water levels of the Niger River, one of the country’s largest rivers, urging states to be on alert.
Extreme rainfall events are expected to increase in frequency and intensity across almost all of Africa, including Nigeria, as human-caused climate change heats the planet, projections from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change show.
On Wednesday, floodwaters that gushed from an overflowing dam in northern Nigeria engulfed a zoo and swept animals including crocodiles and snakes into nearby communities.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
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