28 killed, 800 houses burned in Niger

SANAA, Dec. 15 (YPA) – Unidentified gunmen killed at least 28 people, injured 100 and burned 800 homes in an attack in in Niger’s Diffa region on Saturday, according to Nigerien and United Nations officials.

The organization has not identified who was behind Sunday’s attack, but Boko Haram has been carrying out attacks in the area around Lake Chad since 2009, causing some 250,000 people to flee, according to UN figures.

Agence France-Presse reported that the group claimed responsibility for the attack in a three-minute video sent to the agency.

The country’s government said in a statement that the latest attack “targeted the village of Tomur, less than 20 kilometers from the border with Nigeria”.

Some victims in Diffa were shot and others burned to death inside their homes.

Government spokesman Abdul Rahman Zakaria declared a 72-hour national mourning.

Boko Haram gunmen killed at least 100 farmers and injured others working in rice fields in Nigeria’s northeastern city of Maiduguri on November 28th.

E.M