-- mexico city. >> a reminder of our top stories. brazil has recorded its highest number of deaths from coronavirus in a single day. 1006 hundred 41 fatalities were registered, surpassing the. 's record set in july. health officials are appealing for a national lockdown to help stop the spread of the virus. we have more from rio de janeiro. >> they are now extremely worried, many of them because they are seeing the situation get out of control.

we are in the summer here. the second wave should have come in what would be the winter. that would be june or july. they have asked for a nationwide curfew but the president himself has always been against any sort of measure that he feels will shut down commerce in any way. >> u.s. president joe biden says he is confident that he will reach his goal of delivering 100 million covid-19 vaccine doses in his freshman hundred days in office. he has praised the company merck for helping johnson to create its covid-19 -- johnson and johnson to create their covid jab. the u.s. has sanctioned to military leaders of rebels in

yemen. last month, the state department removed a terrorist designation imposed on the tease by the trump administration. it was reversed over fears that it could stop aid from getting through and worsen yemen's humanitarian crisis. programs will be severely cut after a appeal for money fell short of its goal. the target was $4 billion but about 1.7 billion was raised. i will be back with more news in 30 minutes here on al jazeera. you can see those stories on our website. inside story is next.

>> free at last, gunmen in northern nigeria released hundreds of kidnapped schoolgirlsut abductis like these are the rise. cannything be done to break the cle? this is inside story. hello and welcome to the program. i am rob matheson. nigeria's government is hailing the release of kidnapped schoolchildren. the governor insists no ransom was paid. so-called repentant bandits helped secure the release.

abductions in northern meijer area -- nigeria are becoming more the british and frequent. -- more frequent and lucrative. >> they arrived at don, got into the office of the governor, exhausted, some of them too sick to walk. this is in an office where cabinet meetings are normally held. they gathered their strength to tell us what happened. >> they drove us like animals. some of us were falling and getting injured. they made us track for two to three hours and spent the first two days in the camp, he pushed us forward and threatened to kill anyone who moved. despite the blisters on their feet, they forced us to move until we reached the second and the third camp.

the 279 students were kidnapped while they were sleeping in their dormitories. similar to the kidnapping of more than 270 girls in 2014. this man, a former bandits has he helps get some of the -- bandit has said that he helped to get some of the girls back. >> they spoke about their grievances and why they took the girls. it was a long difficult process through -- for attention but we became -- we came ready and prepared for what we have seen. >> the girls have been taken for medical examinations before they are reunited with their families but that has not stopped exciting parents. si>> my joy is indescribable. i called my wife to tell her that the girls are back. i have not seen my daughter but

i am glad they are back. the past four days have been traumatic. now we can afford to eat, sleep and smile. >> those repentant ones are working for security. >> the kidnapping of these girls on friday came hours before the release of another set of students kidnapped in central nigeria. >> with the girls back, we are now shifting to the future of education. with schools continuously being targeted in northern parts of

nigeria, there are fears that they have the highest rates of poverty and they may fall even further behind. >> it is not clear if these goals will have the first to return to school or even if their parents will allow them to retu. for now, they are happy to enjoy their freedom, hoping the government will do more to protect them. >> kidnapping is an increase in the common tactic used by armed groups and criminal gangs across the area but the government ducted 42 people including 27 students from secondary school. more than 300 people were taken on a raid in cut scene estate -- in this state. in a case which grabbed worldwide attention in 2014, 276 of these girls were kidnapped.

let's bring in our guest. mike is the former director of the state security service. from london, we have an analyst of the 20 institute for global change. kidnapping children seems to be becoming a growth industry in nigeria. why is that happening and why is it happening now? >> kidnapping children is becoming a thing in nigeria. this is why terrorists and criminals target children. children are the softest target you can find anywhere. they want to defend themselves. nigerians are so exposed to attacks because there is no security presence around

schools. terrorists know that children, kidnapping children is an excellent problem and they can extort money from the government. finally, terrorists and criminals have seen there are no consequences to action. this is not the first time that children have been kidnapped in nigeria. nobody was how to account. if terrorists get paid to release the children. >> i want to come to you now. these games are being described as terrorists. are these akin to boko haram?

are there wider groups? >> they are by their action, terrorists. they are terrorizing society. they are acting just like boko haram acted when they abducted girls from two book -- from this other state they are doing exactly what boko haram did. it is a very strategic decision. it is a very strategic way of joint attention, making

governments get down on their knees. number one, they want money and number two, they want to be seen to have the upper hand. in a way, i think they are terrorists. let us look at the problem of where we are today. these are people that we knew -- many of them complained of injustice as a group. i am not making excuses for them .

there is a group of vigilantes. they are victimizing them. many of them love their family members. what i am expecting is as long as we use a similar action of violence, we need to start thinking of the economic solution. that is why we look at them as terrorists and we should also look at the injustice that has been done. injustice begets injustice. >> given what was said there,

the logistics of rounding up 300 her five schoolgirls and transporting them from a school are significant. that takes some organization. >> before i answer your question, i think i want to draw the distinction. this is just organized crime. like boko haram, --

they talking about how they are organized. how are they moved? how are they fed? there is more to it that needs looking into. one of the victims, one of the girls -- it is the question.

it becomes consistent with this area. >> let me ask you. let me interrupt you. there was an estimate that the kidnappers received at least $11 million between 2016 and march of 2020. that money is going somewhere and one would imagine that therefore, the threat from these groups is getting bigger because they are now better equipped and better organized and have more ready cash at their disposal. >> that is very correct.

this money is changing hands. they have to ask this question, how are they doing this? if they're not getting their ransom, how are they getting the money to finance this? we are going from fighting to using the military. >> i will stop you there.

>> my colleague is saying that it is wrong for government to negotiate. if i ask my colleague now if it is right to allow those schoolgirls to die, if the government does not negotiate, i am sure that my colleague would not let those girls died because the question is where are those girls going? they are using those girls as human shields. some of the people that were recently released, some of the bandits were asking where they were kept.

the criminals made up their mind to hear all of them. rescue attempt like that -- attempts like that never end well. >> mike, your nodding your head. >> yes. [indiscernible] should we allow this group to continue. [indiscernible]

we should not allow him peace after this incident. to flush these people out, you can't -- [indiscernible] >> there was a saves close initiative that was introduced in nigeria with much pomp and circumstance but not many of the schools in the northwest are part of this. why has that not been ruled out more across nigeria? >> excellent question. before i go to that, i would want to respond to what mike said around the distinction of terrorists and criminals. i have studied the northwest and the northeast for 10 years and the distinction is not making that tenable. boko haram was ideological and has clinical objectives while

the bandits in the northwest have pure economic motives. number one, these people are using purely terroristic methods. they queued dozens of people and brought hundreds of people, including children. there has been mounting evidence in the last 18 months that boko haram has infiltrated enemies. that is why they claimed responsibility for december and also released an exclusive video of the boys in the bush, telling you clearly about boko haram and that they have to do with some elements of bandits. the bandits themselves in the northwest are making political demands in the last few must. we have seen the injustices and

the exclusion from government. they are no longer groups with purely economic motives. >> let's move along from the differentials of the ideologies. talk to me about the safe schools initiative. given everything that all three of you gentlemen have said, it would seem that the safe schools initiative was at least a good start in terms of protecting children from the games you have been talking about. why has that not been used better or more widely in nigeria? >> the safe schools initiative was introduced in 2014 after the abduction of the 276 girls in boko haram's custom.

why the initiative has not been effective is because it has not been implemented. it was just declared by the government. what we see, it is not -- it was just declared by governments. we saw a abductor and similar to end 100 girls were taken -- when 100 girls were taken. schools are completely exposed in nigeria. hundreds of government invaded the school and they only met one student teacher who is not a police officer or trained to

defend anyone. >> i want to ask this security question. villagers were sold -- told to stand up to the attackers. is that feasible? what is the risk if you get vigilantes banding together that you just exacerbate the problem? >> that is the solution to the problem. . . people --

[indiscernible] the people have surrendered that ability to government. [indiscernible] >> one of the problems seems to be that as i understand it, the police services in the military are controlled by the federal government and this is essentially a state-level problem at the moment and state governors are saying this is something the federal government should be helping them with. if i understand it, they are saying this is a state problem, who is responsible for this? >> it a federal problem.

the state governments haven't got that power to deploy the military were even the conditional release. we have had situations in the past where they have tried to remove estate governor. i can't see why they are passing the buck onto the states. >> i wanted to ask about the long-term effect of this. according to unicef, there is a net attendance rate of -3% in nigeria. the level for girls is even lower.

just briefly, if you could, we are beginning to get to the end of the show. >> it is clear that criminals and terrorists in nigeria have declared a war on education and nigerian children are being forced to choose between their lives and their education and no child should have to make that decision. parents have seen the decision to send their children to school as a difficult one and this will swell the number of nigerian children out of school. as we speak, there are at least 10.5 million children out of school and as long as these attacks continue, these numbers will continue to grow. even for those who continue to go to school, you know there are mental healthry issues associatd with traumas like this. effective teaching and learning does not take place in an atmosphere of fear.

it is for the international community to work together to make sure that every single nigerian child enjoys the ride to education -- right to education. >> i want to say thank you to all of our guests. thank you for watching. you can watch this and our previous episodes any time by visiting our website, al jazeera.com. for further discussion, go to facebook.com/inside story. you can -- facebook.com/ ajinsidestory. buy for now.

>> make a change, change your life or the path of a country, challenge the accepted truth. >> upturned the status quo and fight injustice -- upturn the status quo and fight injustice. witness documentaries that fight this. >> they don't care about the workers, all they re about is making money. >> china will not be left out. >> calling for the bloated defense budget to be cut.

donald trump: i'm establishing new vetting measures to keep radical islamic terrorists out of the uited states of america. we don't want 'em here. lara kiswani: there's a stigma of arab people, muslim people in this country designed to perpetuate and justify the war on terror, and that's what a lot of arabs and muslims are facing today, sort of a really undignified struggle to just live. dr. ramzi salti: it takes courage to be able to stand up to racism, turn it into a positive moment a moment of learning where you actually use that moment to educate, to let people know about the rich diversity of your culture. lamees dahbour: we want our community, like, san francisco