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(Breaking News!) At least 69 dead as Boko Haram storms Kastina

Published

10 years ago

March 13, 2014

Gunmen on motorbikes in northwest Nigeria’s
Katsina state killed at least 69 people in attacks on four villages, a
local lawmaker told AFP Thursday, amid rising communal tension
in the region.
The state’s police chief, Hurdi Mohammed, who gave a lower toll of
30 dead, told AFP the violence was perpetrated by ethnic Fulani
herdsmen who have been blamed for scores of deadly raids.
“So far, 69 bodies have been recovered from the attacks carried out by
a large group of gunmen riding on motorcycles,” said Katsina
lawmaker Abbas Abdullahi Michika of the violence which first broke
out late Tuesday.
“The victims include men, women and children. Rescue teams are still
combing nearby bushes in search for more bodies,” he told AFP.
He specified that 47 people were killed in the village of Mararrabar
Maigora while seven deaths were recorded in both Kura Mota and
Unguwar Rimi.
Another eight people were killed in Maigora, according to Michika.
Fulani leaders have for years complained about the loss of grazing
land which is crucial to their livelihood, with resentment between the
herdsmen and their agrarian neighbours rising over the past decade.
Most of the Fulani-linked violence has been concentrated in the
religiously divided centre of the country, where rivalries between
mostly Muslim herdsmen and mostly Christian farmers have helped
fuel the unrest.
While there is no religion element to the conflict in Katsina, which is
overwhelmingly Muslim, tension between the Fulani and ethnically
Hausa farmers has worsened in recent months. Residents have blamed
the Fulani for several violent robberies this year.
The police chief insisted the attacks were not linked to Islamist group
Boko Haram, whose insurgency has killed more than 500 people in
the northeast already this year.