Twenty seven villagers and seven soldiers were killed in an attack by a group of armed men in Nigeria’s Zamfara state, the head of a vigilante group and residents said.
The attack took place on Monday afternoon in the remote Dan Gulbi district of the Maru local government area in Zamfara state, Ismail Magaji, the head of the local vigilante group told media.
Lawali Zonai, a resident of the area, told media that the attack resulted in the deaths of 27 villagers, while seven military personnel were ambushed while en route to assist the community during the incident.
For the past three years, gangs of heavily armed men, commonly known as bandits, have unleashed devastation across Nigeria’s northwest. They have kidnapped thousands of people, claimed hundreds of lives, and rendered road travel and farming unsafe in certain regions.
The attacks have posed a significant challenge to Nigeria’s security forces, who are already stretched thin while grappling with a 14-year Islamist insurgency in the northeast, violent farmer-herder conflicts and sectarian clashes in the central region, and increasing attacks by a separatist group in the southeast.