Sixteen Nigerian students have been arrested by police in Moscow, accused of trashing the inside of their country’s embassy and smashing furniture when they realized that Russia wasn’t paying their grants.
The 16 were ordered by Nigerian embassy staffers to leave the building and were subsequently detained by Russian police, BBC reported. All attend colleges in Russia, the Russian interior minister said.
This isn’t the first time Nigerian students have reacted in anger to unpaid grants by either their hosting or home countries. A year ago, other students upset at the non-payment of their promised grants beat up one of the Nigerian embassy officials, BBC reported.
The recent incident occurred at the embassy on Malaya Nikitskaya Street after students were given a hearing to address their financial issues. The students allegedly starting smashing the furniture in the reception area and threatened to do the same in other embassy rooms if they didn’t receive their money, BBC said.
Russian grant money has paid for thousands of students from Africa to attend school over the last few decades.
• Cheryl K. Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com.
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