One vigilante and four female suicide bombers were killed Wednesday at a checkpoint in Borno State after one bomber detonated her explosives, according to the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA).
One bomber blew herself up at the security checkpoint 50 kilometres East of the state capital, Maiduguri, run by civilian vigilantes who help military fight Boko Haram.
Four girls between the ages of nine and 12 were stopped at the checkpoint in Mafa, according to Muhammad Kanar, head of NEMA for the Northeast.
“Suicide bombers tried to enter and they were being intercepted for interrogation,” Ibrahim Abdulkadir, another spokesman for the agency, told AFP.
“One detonated her bomb,” he said, adding, “all of them were bombers, all women.”
Last month, eight people were killed at the same checkpoint when a female suicide bomber detonated her explosives among women and children arriving in Maiduguri seeking to escape Boko Haram violence in the villages.
Boko Haram jihadists have in recent months been using young women and girls as suicide bombers — a new tactic in the six-year-old armed insurgency which has claimed more than 17,000 lives.
-AFP