Religion of Peace™

KANO, Nigeria – Coordinated bomb attacks targeting security forces and gun battles have killed at least 121 people in Nigeria’s second-largest city of Kano, with bodies littering the streets on Saturday.

A curfew was imposed on Kano in Nigeria’s mainly Muslim north after it exploded into violence on Friday evening, with eight police and immigration offices or residences targeted.

The main newspaper in the north said that a purported spokesman for Islamist group Boko Haram had claimed responsibility for the violence, saying it was in response to authorities’ refusal to release their members from custody.

Scores of such attacks in Nigeria’s north have been blamed on Boko Haram.

Some 20 huge blasts could be heard in the city as a suicide bomber attacked a regional police office and a car bomb rocked the outside of state police headquarters after the attacker fled and was shot dead, police sources said.

A number of other police posts were targeted, including a secret police building, as well as immigration offices.

Gunshots rang out in several areas, and a local television journalist was among those shot dead as he covered the unrest.

“Many agencies are involved in the evacuation of corpses from the streets,” a Red Cross source said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to speak publicly. “From our tally, we have 121 so far.”