11 killed in Nigeria suicide bombing

SANAA, Jan. 9 (YPA) – Eight refugees and three soldiers were killed in clashes triggered by a suicide bombing and burning down of a refugee camp in northeastern Nigeria, officials said Wednesday evening.

According to AFP, a Nigerian security source said that during armed clashes between a military force and takfiri armed elements in Monguno (135 km north of Maiduguri, capital of Borno state), a car bomb exploded as a military convoy passed by.

“The explosion killed three soldiers and wounded eight others,” the source added.

“It was a suicide car bomb attack on a military vehicle during heavy fighting,” a second security source said.

The source explained that dozens of ISIS fighters attacked and surrounded the city of on Monguno pick-up trucks with machine guns.

During the fighting, a refugee camp housing thousands of people was hit by a rocket, causing a fire that engulfed more than 300 tents, killing eight refugees and injuring 20 others, said Kolo Jana, a resident of the city.

Local residents said that the gunmen also stormed headquarters belonging to humanitarian organizations, but that they were empty because their staff evacuated the area before the attack, which the army was eventually able to repel and secure the city.

Boko Haram and ISIS, which split in 2016, are active in northeastern Nigeria.

Boko Haram’s 10-year insurgency has left 36,000 people dead and nearly 2 million displaced in northeastern Nigeria, with violence taking place in neighbouring Niger, Chad and Cameroon.

E.M