Saturday, November 05, 2011

Dozens Killed, 100 Injured in Northern Nigerian Attacks On Maiduguri, Damaturu

Dozens killed, 100 injured in attacks in Maiduguri, Damaturu – Witnesses

On November 5, 2011

KANO (AFP) – Bomb and gun attacks in Nigeria’s northeastern city of Damaturu — targetting police stations and churches — left dozens of people dead and at least 100 injured, witnesses said Saturday.

The attackers bombed a city police headquarters, three other police stations and several churches in the city late Friday, after similar raids were carried out in another city that had already been the target of attacks by an Islamist sect.

A lawyer who visited Damaturu government hospital Saturday looking for a missing friend said he counted 60 bodies in the morgue.

“I have seen 60 dead bodies in the hospital, all brought in yesteday from the attacks,” the lawyer, who asked not be named, told AFP by phone.

“I am here to look for my friend who didn’t return home yesterday.”

He said anxious relatives were trooping into the hospital in search of loved ones.

A senior local government official in the city, who said he did not have permission to speak to the media, told AFP that the hospital was full to the brim with the injured following the late Friday bombings and gun attacks.

“The general hospital is full with people who were injured in the attack. If I say there are hundreds injured, it’s not an over-estimation. Everywhere is full with the injured,” he said, without giving a death toll.

The auhorities were not immediately available to comment.

Gunmen bombed police posts and churches in the city before engaging in gunbattles with security forces, hours after a lunchtime suicide attack targeted an army base in the northeastern city of Maiduguri.

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