Boko Haram blamed for killing 30 in attack

JOHANNESBURG — Boko Haram has been torn in half and has steadily lost territory to the Nigerian forces that have pounded away at the extremist group, with government leaders at times claiming that the insurgency had finally been put down.

But a pair of suicide bombings Friday in a busy marketplace in Madagali, Nigeria, quickly underscored the difficulty in quashing the extremist militia, which authorities quickly blamed for the blasts.

At least 30 people were killed, the worst attack in months. Authorities said the bombers appeared to be teenage schoolgirls who likely picked the busiest market day of the week to attack.

Though weakened, Boko Haram remains capable of devastating attacks on soft civilian targets such as markets, bus stations and camps for people displaced by the grinding conflict.

Like many of Boko Haram’s previous bombings, the attacks Friday in Adamawa state were carried out by female suicide bombers, concealing explosive vests under the long flowing garments worn by most women in the country’s northern territory, where the majority of the population is Muslim.

Meanwhile, mass violence is not occurring only in Nigeria’s northern region, unfortunately.

Amnesty International has accused Nigerian security forced of a “chilling campaign” of torture and killings to clamp down on a pro-Biafran independence movement in the country’s southeastern region. Between August 2015 and August 2016, it says Nigeria’s military killed at least 150 pro-Biafran protesters.