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At least 40 people have been killed after terrorists riding roughly 50 motorcycles stormed a village in Nigeria’s Taraba State on Friday, opening fire right after Muslim residents finished Friday prayers.
Getting into it: The attack hit Binnari, a market village in the Karim Lamido Local Government Area, at about 3 p.m. on October 23. Community leader Malam Abubakar Saifullahi said the attackers rode in two to a bike, which puts the raiding party near 100 men. They opened fire on residents, stripped shops of cash, food and supplies, set homes and storefronts on fire, and rode off on motorcycles residents had dumped as they ran. Police and locals believe the group came across the border from neighboring Plateau State.
The death toll has climbed fast, and nobody agrees on it. Taraba police first said officers had found 10 people shot dead by Friday evening and released the bodies to their families to be buried according to Muslim custom. Residents told AFP the number was at least 20, and Binnari resident Sa’idu Nuhu said they “counted more than 20 bodies, and some people were still missing.” Channels Television later reported 37 dead once locals went out looking through the brush and riverbanks around the village, and Amnesty International put the toll at 40 on Saturday.
“The community is now littered with dead bodies, some burnt beyond recognition,” Amnesty International Nigeria said in a Saturday statement that accused authorities of leaving rural northern communities exposed to armed gangs and called for an impartial probe and compensation for the people who lived through it.
Police spokesman ASP Victor Mshelizah said joint teams made up of police tactical units, the Police Mobile Force, the Nigerian Army and other agencies have been sent to the area, and Taraba Police Commissioner Edwin Ogbegaghagha ordered them to head off any follow-up attacks and find the people responsible. No arrests have been announced, no group has claimed the attack, and the Taraba State government had not said anything publicly as of Saturday.
This all comes as armed gangs looking for cash keep hitting rural towns across northern and central Nigeria, kidnapping people and shaking down farmers, while the military is still fighting a jihadist insurgency in the northeast that started with Boko Haram in 2009.






