More than a dozen exam candidates abducted in central Nigeria

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Benue: Fourteen people were abducted in central Nigeria's Benue state while traveling to sit a university entrance exam, police and witnesses said.

Nigeria's Middle Belt region, including Benue and neighbouring Plateau states, has for years suffered deadly farmer-herder clashes over dwindling land as well as attacks from armed criminals known as "bandits".

Benue's police commissioner Ifeanyi Emenari said the young people were kidnapped while travelling on a bus bound for the town of Otukpo where the exam was set to take place.

"Fourteen passengers were kidnapped while one escaped. We are on the ground to ensure the victims are rescued," he said.

"The victims are mainly young boys and girls coming to Otukpo," said Maxwell Ogiri, chairman of the Otukpo council, adding that security forces had been deployed to the forest to rescue them.

Local resident and trader Mathew Mwasse said the abduction occurred on Wednesday evening and that one passenger and the driver had managed to escape.

Candidates across the region are sitting exams in a tense atmosphere.

In Jos, the capital of Plateau State, which has witnessed recent upheavals that lead to the killing of at least 30 people by gunmen, heavy security has been placed around examination centres.