Officials in Nigeria’s northeastern Borno state now say that only 20 of 129 kidnapped schoolgirls were back with their families, and the military has retracted its boast that it freed most of them.  Boko Haram Islamist militants abducted the girls during a raid on their school earlier this week.

“So far, we have seen 20 students, many of whom escaped from the abductors.  The principal of the school has so far received (them),” said Borno state Education Commissioner Inuwa Kubo.  “Many of the parents are still waiting in pain.”

That is a far cry from the success the military had earlier claimed.

“In the light of the denial by the principal of the school, the Defense Headquarters wishes to defer to the school principal and governor’s statement on the number of students still missing and retract (the) ... earlier statement while the search continues,” said Defense Headquarters spokesman Chris Olukolade.

Monday’s mass kidnapping of 129 teenage girls in the arid northeast happened just hours after bombs attributed to Boko Haram ripped through a bus depot outside the capital Abuja, killing more than 70 people and leaving many more with gruesome injuries.  The attacked shocked Nigerians, who had started to build up a resistance to bad news.  More than 1,500 people have been killed in violence from Boko Haram attacks so far this year.