{"id":82770,"date":"2026-02-16T13:32:13","date_gmt":"2026-02-16T13:32:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/?p=82770"},"modified":"2026-02-16T13:32:13","modified_gmt":"2026-02-16T13:32:13","slug":"fresh-abduction-hits-benue-taraba-border-as-police-rescues-nine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/2026\/02\/16\/fresh-abduction-hits-benue-taraba-border-as-police-rescues-nine\/","title":{"rendered":"Fresh Abduction Hits Benue-Taraba Border as Police Rescues Nine"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Omoniyi David<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Nine worshippers abducted during a midnight vigil at St. John\u2019s Catholic Church, Ojije, Utonkon in Ado Local Government Area of Benue State have been rescued unharmed, while a fresh abduction was reported along the Benue-Taraba border.<\/p>\n<p>The freed victims, kidnapped a week ago, regained their freedom on Saturday following coordinated security operations by the Benue State Police Command and other agencies.<\/p>\n<p>Two suspects, Abubakar Jibril and Ashiru Ibrahim, were arrested on February 11 with ammunition, and further raids on February 14 recovered an AK-47 rifle and led to the arrest of two additional suspects.<\/p>\n<p>Police said the operations directly pressured the criminal network, resulting in the safe release of the worshippers.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, tension persists along the Takum-Tor Donga-Katsina Road in Katsina-Ala LGA after a businesswoman and nine passengers were abducted on February 9 at Tse-De while travelling from Taraba State.<\/p>\n<p>Families described the incident as traumatic, with no communication from the abductors.<\/p>\n<p>Governor Hyacinth Alia praised security operatives for their swift response and urged continued collaboration with federal agencies, local vigilantes, and traditional leaders to protect communities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Omoniyi David Nine worshippers abducted during a midnight vigil at St. John\u2019s Catholic Church, Ojije, Utonkon in Ado Local Government Area of Benue State have been rescued unharmed, while a fresh abduction was reported along the Benue-Taraba border. The freed victims, kidnapped a week ago, regained their freedom on Saturday following coordinated security operations [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":82771,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[181,1724,172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-82770","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-crime","category-insecurity","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82770","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82770"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82770\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":82773,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82770\/revisions\/82773"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/82771"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82770"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82770"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82770"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}