Tragic Attack During Friday Prayers in Nigeria Leaves Around 30 Dead

Around 30 people were killed by an armed group during Friday prayers in Sokoto State, northwestern Nigeria, AFP reported.

Samsuddin Mai Akwai, secretary of the local council in Kembe, said yesterday that jihadists from the Lakurawa group were behind last week’s attack. Investigators suspect the group has ties to Islamic State in the Sahel (IS), which operates mainly in the neighboring countries of Mali and Niger.

Mai Akwai said the gunmen entered the village of Ougousi as “worshippers were holding their Friday prayers.”

A resident of the nearby town of Kembe said the attacks carried out by suspected jihadists followed the deaths of four soldiers in the town, also on Friday.

According to the same source, around 30 people were killed in the village of Ugushi.

A police spokesman contacted by AFP confirmed that the village had been attacked and reported 28 fatalities.

In Nigeria’s remote regions, where state authority is limited, reports of massacres in isolated communities often take several days to emerge.

Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country, is experiencing a severe security crisis in the north. The region is plagued both by jihadist organizations and by criminal groups with no defined ideology, motivated mainly by profit and known as bandits.

Northeastern Nigeria remains the epicenter of a jihadist insurgency that has lasted around 17 years. However, some armed groups are expanding their operations into the country’s northwestern and central areas, while other Sahel-based jihadist groups have also expanded in the northwest in recent years.