AP
Maiduguri (Nigeria)
At least 23 people were killed and more than 100 wounded in suspected suicide bombings Monday night that targeted Maiduguri city in northeastern Nigeria, police said Tuesday. It was one of the deadliest attacks in the conflict-battered city in recent history.
Residents and emergency services earlier told The Associated Press that three explosions were reported in crowded places in Maiduguri, the capital of Borno state, including in a major market and at the entrance of the University of Maiduguri Teaching Hospital.
“Regrettably, a total of 23 persons lost their lives, while 108 others sustained varying degrees of injuries,” Borno police spokesperson Nahum Kenneth Daso said in a statement that blamed the attacks on suspected suicide bombers.
No group has claimed responsibility for the attacks, but suspicion quickly fell on the Boko Haram jihadi group, which in 2009 launched an insurgency in northeastern Nigeria to enforce their radical interpretation of Shariah.
Boko Haram has since become stronger, with thousands of fighters and different factions, including the Islamic State West Africa Province, which is backed by the Islamic State group.
Maiduguri city has been at the heart of the deadly violence but has in recent years experienced relative peace even as the countryside is often battered by extremists.
The attack took place less than 24 hours after the Nigerian military repelled attacks by militants on the outskirts of Maiduguri, in what some residents say could have been planned as a distraction.
By Tuesday morning, there was heavy security deployment in the affected locations and along major roads in the city, but many public places remained closed amid heightened fear.
“Investigations are ongoing to further ascertain the circumstances surrounding the incidents and to bring perpetrators to justice,” the Borno police command said.
Past attacks in the city have been limited to one-off incidents that occur once in a long while, including a suicide attack that killed five at a mosque on Christmas Eve last year.
“Maiduguri being attacked is like an insult for the security forces … And for the (jihadi) groups, it is symbolic because it shows nowhere is out of their reach,” said Malik Samuel, a Nigerian security researcher with Good Governance Africa.
