Nigerian teachers stage national strike. 

Nigerian teachers went on strike and staged rallies nationwide on Thursday in protest against the kidnapping of more than 200 schoolgirls by the Islamist Boko Haram sect and the killing of nearly as many teachers during its insurgency.

Boko Haram gunmen stormed a school outside the remote northeastern town of Chibok on April 14, carting some 270 girls away in trucks. More than 50 have since escaped but at least 200 remain in captivity, as do scores of other girls kidnapped previously.

National Union of Teachers (NUT) President Micheal Alogba Olukoya told reporters Boko Haram, whose name means "Western education is sinful," had killed 173 teachers over five years.