Suspected Boko Haram militants killed dozens of people and burned down homes in two villages in northeast Nigeria’s Borno state, police and a security source said on Monday.
The attacks on Kalwa and Gwollam villages in the Monguno local government area of Borno state, just over 100 km from state capital Maiduguri, began on Friday night and continued into Saturday morning, a security source said, Reuters reported.
“Many persons were reported killed and several houses were burnt,” said Borno Police Commissioner Aderemi Opadokun, who said the attackers were suspected members of Boko Haram.
Nobody has taken responsibility for the raid, but it has the hallmarks of the militant group that has killed thousands of people and forced around 1.5 million others to flee their homes during a six-year insurgency.
According to Amnesty International, at least 17,000 people, mostly civilians, have been killed since 2009, when Boko Haram launched its violent uprising to try to impose militant rule.
Since then, some 400 people have been killed in attacks blamed on the extremists, who have sworn allegiance to the Islamic State group.
The group is still holding many women, girls and children captive, including 219 schoolgirls it kidnapped from a school in Chibok in April last year.
