Halima Ali Maiyanga, one of more than 100 young women still missing, called her father to say she and others had fled Boko Haram militants on Thursday.
“She asked me. Is this my dad? Is this my dad, and she started to cry. It was crying.” [so] a lot and I couldn’t hear her very well. I cried too. I never expected to hear from her again, ”said Ali Maiyanga.
‘The whole family is so happy. Our house is full of people who rejoice with us. ‘
Ali Maiyanga said he did not get a chance to have a good chat with his daughter because she was emotional and the call was short. But he said she and others are safe and looked after by the Nigerian military.
He added that she called from a security officer’s phone line.
CNN has contacted the Nigerian military for official confirmation.
It is not yet clear how many of the remaining missing girls managed to escape.
In 2014, militants stormed a boarding school in the Nigerian village of Chibok and kidnapped 276 girls – an incident that received widespread attention and sparked an international campaign calling for their release with the hashtag #BringBackOurGirls.
Dozens of girls escaped almost immediately after the mass abduction. According to witnesses, another girl was found wandering out of a Nigerian forest asking for help in May 2016.
Since then, nothing had been heard of the 112 young women still in custody.
This is a story in development, more to come …