A Nigerian army drone strike accidently killed at least 85 civilians on Sunday in a village in northwest Kaduna State, officials said, in one of the country’s deadliest military bombing mishaps.
Nigerian President Bola Tinubu yesterday ordered an investigation after the army acknowledged one of its drones aimed at armed groups had accidently struck the Tudun Biri village as residents were celebrating a Muslim festival.
The army did not give any casualty figures, but local residents had said 85 people, many of them women and children, had been killed.
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“The Northwest Zonal Office has received details from the local authorities that 85 dead bodies have so far been buried while search is still ongoing,” the Nigerian National Emergency Management Agency said in a statement.
The agency said another 66 people were being treated at hospital, but emergency officials were still negotiating with community leaders to calm tensions to be able reach the village.
Nigeria’s armed forces often rely on airstrikes in their battle against bandit militias in the northwest and northeast of the country, where militants have been fighting for more than a decade.
“President Tinubu describes the incident as very unfortunate, disturbing, and painful, expressing indignation and grief over the tragic loss of Nigerian lives,” the presidency said in a statement.
The army had said its drone was a routine mission that “inadvertently affected members of the community.”
Many of the victims were women, children and elderly who had been celebrating the Muslim festival of Maulud.
“I was inside the house when the first bomb was dropped... We rushed to the scene to help those affected and then a second bomb was dropped,” local resident Idris Dahiru said. “My aunt, my brother’s wife and her six children, wives of my four brothers were among the dead. My elder brother’s family are all dead, except his infant child who survived.”
Resident Husseini Ibrahim late on Monday said he lost 13 members of his immediate family.
“They included my children and those of my brothers, seven boys and six girls. We buried the victims today,” he said.
Militia gangs have long terrorized parts of northwest Nigeria, operating from bases deep in forests and raiding villages to loot and kidnap residents for ransom.
In the northeast, militants have been pushed back from the territory they held at the height of the conflict, although they continue to fight on in rural areas.
More than 40,000 people have been killed and 2 million displaced since 2009 in that conflict.
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