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Nigeria suicide blast kills Shia Muslims at Ashura procession in Potiskum
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A suicide bomber has killed at least 23 people in a procession of Shia Muslims marking the ceremony of Ashura in Potiskum, north-eastern Nigeria.
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In a separate incident overnight in central Kogi state, gunmen using explosives blew their way into a prison in the city of Lokoja, killing one person and freeing 144 inmates, the prisons coordinator for the state, Adams Omale, said.
In the suicide bombing in Potiskum, Yobe state, a territory at the heart of an insurgency by the Sunni Muslim Boko Haram rebels, the attacker joined the line of Shias before setting off his device as they marched through a market, a resident, Yusuf Abdullahi, said.
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“I heard a very heavy explosion as if it happened in my room. It took place just 200 metres from my house,” he said. Another person carrying an explosive that did not go off was arrested, he added.
Mohammed Gana, whose brother was killed in the attack, said he counted 23 bodies at the scene. Another Potiskum resident, Abubakar Saliu, said soldiers started shooting immediately after the explosion, but it was not clear who they fired at or if anyone was hit by the gunfire.
Ashura marks the death at the Battle of Karbala more than 1,300 years ago of the prophet Muhammad’s grandson, Hussein.
Boko Haram’s five-year campaign for an Islamic state, which has killed thousands, is seen as the main security threat to Nigeria, Africa’s biggest economy and its leading oil producer.
Omale said 26 of the Lokoja prison inmates freed in the Kogi raid had been recaptured. He did not comment on whether any of the escaped prisoners were Boko Haram members.
Nigeria’s government announced last month that a ceasefire had been agreed with Boko Haram and that talks were under way in neighbouring Chad for the release of more than 200 Nigerian schoolgirls abducted in April by the Islamist rebels.
But although Chad, which is mediating, has said the negotiations are still continuing, a spate of recent attacks across north-east Nigeria by suspected Boko Haram fighters has raised serious doubts about whether a lasting peace pact can be achieved.
Prospects for this took another hit last week when a man claiming to be the Boko Haram leader, Abubakar Shekau, said in a video recording that the kidnapped girls had been “married off” to his fighters, contradicting the Nigerian government’s statements that they would soon be freed.
Nigeria’s military says it killed Shekau a year ago, and authorities said in September they had killed an impostor posing as him in videos.
President Goodluck Jonathan, who is seeking a second term in elections in February, has faced rising criticism at home and abroad for failing to halt the Boko Haram insurgency and obtain the girls’ release.
In a statement oOn Monday, Nigeria’s opposition All Progressives Congress (APC) accused Jonathan’s government of misleading the public over the reported peace deal. “The president has failed in his most sacred duty – protecting the safety and well being of Nigeria’s citizens,” it said.
