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Suspected Islamist militants opened fire on a school in Maiduguri on Tuesday, killing nine students, witnesses and a medical worker said. This was the second deadly attack on schools in three days.
An eyewitness, Ibrahim Mohammed, said he was taking exams in a classroom at Ansarudeen School when gunmen stormed the building and opened fire at random.
“I saw five students sitting for the exams killed on the spot. Four others were killed as they were entering the school premises,” he explained on the telephone, still shaking with fear.
In another attack on Monday, suspected extremists gunned down a group of fisherman on a river bank in Alau, located 20 kilometers outside Maiduguri.
It was believed that 13 fishermen were killed during the attack.
Most of the victims were relatives of people who have been arresting members of a radical Islamic sect known as Boko Haram.
“They said, ‘Your children brought this fate upon you; they are busy catching our members and handing them to soldiers to be killed’,” recalled one eyewitness, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.
“They then shot them dead, and asked the remaining of us to run for our lives and take the message to the youth vigilante.”
Mortuary attendant, Alhaji Baba, at the State Specialists morgue in Maiduguri told Reuters he counted nine corpses brought in after the attack.
The military was not immediately available for comment.
Seven students, two teachers and two insurgents were killed when suspected Boko Haram militants attacked a school in Damaturu on Sunday.
The two attacks have raised fears that a month-long offensive by government troops has merely pushed militants into hiding, from where they can still launch devastating operations.
In a separate attack, armed bandits attacked Kizera village in northwest Nigeria’s Zamfara state on Thursday, killing at least 32 people, local police chief Usman Gwary said.
-Punch
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