Boko Haram burns kids alive in northeast Nigeria

The Islamist militant group opened fire on residents, torched houses and three suicide bombers blew themselves up in Dalori village near Maiduguri.

Former residents of Baga on the border with Chad – which was the scene of a massacre past year in which up 2,000 people were killed – are reportedly too frightened to return home as Boko Haram fighters retreated to the heavily guarded islands around Lake Chad.

People walk past burnt out houses following an attack by Boko haram in Dalori village, Nigeria on Sunday Jan. 31, 2016.

Boko Haram militants burned dozens of children alive as they firebombed a village in northeastern Nigeria on Saturday, according to a witness who watched the massacre from the refuge of a nearby tree.

It was learnt that the decision of the soldiers to prevent the fleeing residents of Wanori village from gaining entrance to Maiduguri might not be unconnected to fears that Boko Haram might be using the attack as a cover to sneak in suicide bombers.

He said three female suicide bombers trying to mix with the villagers were “intercepted and subsequently got blown up”. It was the third attack this week suspected to have been carried out by Boko Haram.

An aid worker who did not want to be named, said the bodies of the victims had been evacuated to the hospital.

Dalori is near camps set up for people displaced by the seven-year Boko Haram insurgency in the northeast.

The source said the villagers who had always been on the alert for the insurgents, were deceived by the fact that they came in Hilux Vans and were dressed in Camouflage hence they (villagers) mistook the terrorists for troops on patrol.

It was the worst attack in the region in a month; Boko Haram managed to kill more than 50 people in Maiduguri at the end of December.

He said during the 45-minute military “fierce repulsion” lives were also lost, while some people sustained various degrees of injuries, while fleeing the attacked village in the evening of Saturday.