Armed men have violently stormed a village in Nigeria's Niger state, killing at least 30 people and looting shops, state authorities have said.
The attackers emerged from a forest near the village of Kasuwan-Daji on Saturday and set fire to the local market, looted shops, and kidnapped an unspecified number of people, police reported.
The gunmen entered the town on motorcycles carrying weapons, rounded up people, and then proceeded to slaughter them, while others were shot dead, a local journalist informed the BBC's Hausa service.
Attacks and kidnappings by armed criminal gangs, known as bandits, have plagued Nigeria for years, particularly escalated in the western and central regions recently.
Abdullahi Rofia, an official with the Niger State Emergency Management Agency, confirmed that villagers were rounded up and killed. People in the community are terrified: They are hiding, they are too afraid to talk to anybody, he stated.
The Niger State police spokesperson, Wasiu Abiodun, mentioned that an emergency team has been deployed to assist the injured, and security forces are attempting to rescue those kidnapped.
Although it's illegal to pay ransom to these criminal groups, which the government has identified as terrorists, there's a strong suggestion that this law is often ignored.
A witness to the attack remarked that there were no security forces present in the village and expressed the community's desperation for help, comparing their plight to dying like chickens.
This tragic incident occurred just a day after local authorities announced the phased reopening of schools that had been closed due to a previous mass kidnapping in the area.
In November, over 250 students and staff from St Mary's Catholic school in Papiri had been abducted, marking one of the gravest kidnapping events in Nigeria; however, officials confirmed that the victims were rescued just before Christmas.
