Gunmen ambushed and killed at least 62 members of a volunteer vigilante group in Kebbi state, the head of the group and a police spokesman said, in the worst violence to hit the state since mid-January.
Many northwestern states in Nigeria have groups of volunteers who help defend villages and towns from armed gangs as the security forces are stretched fighting Islamist militants and the gangs, known as bandits.
“They lay in ambush, hid their motorcycles in the shrubs, circled us and opened fire from different directions,” Sani, a retired soldier, said on Tuesday. He said 62 people had been killed.
Kebbi police spokesman Nafiu Abubakar confirmed the ambush but said he did not have details on how many people had been killed.
Gunmen have spread terror across the northwest, where they have kidnapped hundreds of school children and villagers for ransom.
The violence has compounded the problems in northern states, which are typically poorer than those in the south. (Reuters)
