Nigeria – Female Bombers Age 11 & 18 Cause Deaths & Destruction in Northern Nigeria

https://edition.cnn.com/2015/11/18/africa/nigeria-blasts/index.html

Nigeria – Female Bombers Ages 11 and 18 Cause Deaths & Destruction in Northern Nigeria

By Aminu Abubakar and Eliott C. McLaughlin, CNN – November 19, 2015

Bombers, 11 and 18, detonate explosives at market in Kano, police say. At least 46 killed, 120 injured in bombings in Nigerian cities of Yola, Kano

“Human parts littered the place,” resident tells Nigerian newspaper of Yola blast

Lagos, Nigeria (CNN)Two bomb attacks in 24 hours — one of them involving an 11-year-old female bomber — killed dozens of people and wounded more than 120 others in the Nigerian cities of Yola and Kano, authorities said.

At least 31 people were killed and 72 others injured in a bomb blast Tuesday evening in the northeastern city of Yola, Aliyu Maikano, a local Red Cross official, said.

It was not clear whether the blast was from a planted device or the work of a suicide bomber, according to reports.

An official from the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), Sa’ad Bello, gave a slightly higher toll of 32 dead and 80 injured, while hospital officials gave newspapers an even higher total.

Roughly 400 miles to the northwest, in Kano, two bombings killed 15 people and injured at least 123 in a mobile phone market, Kano state police commissioner Muhammad Musa Katsina said.

The two bombers, who Katsina said were females ages 11 and 18, blew themselves up at about 4 p.m. local time, during the peak of trading, he said. A minivan carrying four other children believed to be bombers dropped the girls off, he said.

Police searching for the minivan set up checkpoints around the city and along its outskirts. Armed policemen conducted searches on motorists entering the city.

No group has claimed responsibility for the attack, but Boko Haram, a militant Islamist group, is the prime suspect. The terrorist outfit hit the same market in January 2012, killing 185 people in bomb and gun attacks there.

Yola blast

Tuesday evening’s explosion ripped through the crowded Tipper Garage in the Jambutu area of the city at about 7:48 p.m., ‎shortly after evening prayers, Maikano said. The blast came almost a month after a deadly mosque attack in the same area.

“I cannot say how many people died in the explosion, but human parts littered the place. It happened when traders were closing shop for the day,” a resident identifying himself only as Mustapha told the Nigerian newspaper, Punch.

The area houses a livestock market, an open-air restaurant and a mosque. The explosion happened as traders were leaving the mosque and others were eating at the restaurant.

Relatives of those who worked in the area converged on Specialist Hospital Yola to determine whether their loved ones had been admitted, according to state-run Nigerian media.

“Since I did not see my brother who was selling sugar cane at the scene of the incident, I have no option but to come to the mortuary,” a man named Adamu told the News Agency of Nigeria.

The hospital had received 29 bodies from the explosion, chief medical director Bala Sa’id told NAN. Thirty people, including six women and eight children, had been admitted with injuries, he said.

The Yola Federal Medical Centre received 37 injured people and four bodies, spokesperson Malam Adamu Dodo said, according to NAN.

Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari visited Yola five days ago to present medals to soldiers fighting Boko Haram militants, as well as a camp for people displaced by the conflict. Buhari declared that the terror organization was close to defeat, according to the Daily Independent, an Ogba-based newspaper.

Buhari urged soldiers “to remain vigilant, alert and focused to prevent Boko Haram from sneaking into our communities to attack soft targets,” the paper reported.

No one has yet claimed responsibility for the blast, but clearly, experts on the group believe Boko Haram operatives should top the list of primary suspects.

“Boko Haram has always shown the intent and operational capacity to carry out attacks such as these,” said Ryan Cummings, chief Africa analyst for the crisis managment company, red24. “Yola has traditionally been an operational stronghold of the group and they have also had an established presence in Kano for some time. Can we draw parallels to what is going on in Paris and this? Likely. Boko Haram is likely to take advantage of the public relations aspect to gain some attention through attacks in its own territory.”

Global terror increased by 80% in 2014

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https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-34859527

“Nigerian officials say many girls are forced to become suicide bombers, and are told that if they refuse they will be killed.”

Nigeria – Two Female Suicide Bombers Kill 11 in Kano Market

18 November 2015 – Two female suicide bombers have killed 11 people in a market in northern Nigeria’s main city, Kano, police say.

Residents say one of the bombs went off inside the Farm Centre mobile phone market, and the other at the entrance.

No-one has said they are responsible but militant Islamist group Boko Haram has previously targeted Kano.

On Tuesday, more than 30 people were killed by a suicide bomber in the north-eastern Yola city in an attack blamed on Boko Haram.

Facebook activated its safety check feature for the first time in Nigeria, after the Yola attack.

President Muhammadu Buhari condemned the Kano and Yola attacks as barbaric.

Witnesses told AFP news agency the explosions in Kano went off just after 15:00 GMT.

Six people were said to have arrived at the scene but two got out of their vehicle and four left before the explosion.

Media captionOn Tuesday, 30 people died in a suicide blast at a market in Yola, as Chris Ewokor reports

Female suicide bombers have attacked Kano before.

In July Kano was attacked by a female suicide bomber who blew herself up outside a mosque killing herself and injuring another person.

A more deadly attack in November 2014 killed more than 100 people at the central mosque.

Nigerian officials say many girls are forced to become suicide bombers, and are told that if they refuse they will be killed.

The Global Terrorism Index says 6,644 deaths were attributed to Boko Haram in 2014, making it the world’s deadliest militant group.

On Tuesday, President Buhari ordered the arrest of his predecessor’s security adviser, for allegedly stealing some $2bn (£1.3bn) meant for military equipment.

Nigerian soldiers have complained that despite the military’s huge budget, they were ill-equipped to fight Boko Haram.

Although the military has this year retaken most of the territory the group had captured.

Boko Haram at a glance:

• Founded in 2002, initially focused on opposing Western-style education – Boko Haram means “Western education is forbidden” in Hausa
• Launched military operations in 2009
• Thousands killed, mostly in north-eastern Nigeria, hundreds abducted, including at least 200 schoolgirls
• Joined so-called Islamic State, now calls itself IS’s “West African province”