At least 30 people have been killed and more than 100 others injured by explosions at two bus stations in north-eastern Nigeria, the Red Cross said Thursday. At least sixty people were wounded in the explosions – suggesting the death toll may well rise further.
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No group has claimed responsibility for the blasts, which locals say bore the operational imprints of Boko Haram. “I counted about seven dead bodies”, Ahmed Abu, a bus driver, said.
The bombings on Wednesday were the latest in a string of attacks by suspected Boko Haram militants in the past few weeks in the northeast of Africa’s most populous nation, which has the continent’s biggest economy.
Details remain sketchy, and it is still unknown whether the blasts were suicide attacks.
Also Wednesday, at least 11 people perished in nearby Cameroon when two young girls blew themselves up at a market in Maroua in the north. “The bodies are badly mutilated and we have several people injured”.
One of the bombers detonated the explosives at the city’s central market, in what is the second such attack in the past week.
Since then, more than 750 people have been killed in Nigeria alone, according to an AFP news agency count.
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The Cameroonian army uses the town of Maroua as the headquarters for its operations against Boko Haram, as part of a multinational force battling the militants in neighbouring parts of Nigeria.
