Nigerian city bombed twice in two days: Boko Haram?

One day after a deadly suicide bomb exploded in a Maiduguri mosque, the city's Gamboru market was bombed Sunday. No one immediately claimed responsibility for the blast, but it bore the hallmarks of the violent insurgent group Boko Haram.

|
Inform
A bomb went off in the Gamboru market in Nigeria's northeastern city of Maiduguri on Sunday, a resident and a military source said.

A bomb went off in the Gamboru market in Nigeria's northeastern city of Maiduguri on Sunday, a resident and a military source said.

One person was killed, a hospital source told Reuters. Three others were injured, the military source said.

On Saturday a suicide bomber blew himself up inside a mosque after Boko Haram militants attacked the outskirts of the city overnight. At least 29 people were killed.

The military source said the explosives in Sunday's blast were concealed in a bag of charcoal inside the market, about 300 meters from the state customs office.

There was no immediate claim for the blast, which is typical for such attacks, but it bore the hallmarks of Boko Haram.

The capital of Nigeria's Borno state, home to about 2 million people, is the birthplace of the six-year Islamist insurgency waged by Boko Haram to carve out a state adhering to strict sharia law.

"I heard the sound of a bomb explosion inside Gamboru market as I approached the area to buy vegetables. An ambulance later brought out four people seriously injured," Felicia Emmanuel, a resident, said.

The group is showing a return to its guerrilla tactics since losing the territory it gained in 2014 after successful offensives by Chadian, Nigerien and Nigerian troops over the past few months. It maintains a last stronghold in the Sambisa forest reserve.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to Nigerian city bombed twice in two days: Boko Haram?
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/World/2015/0531/Nigerian-city-bombed-twice-in-two-days-Boko-Haram
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe