At least 23 people have been killed and more than 100 others injured in multiple suspected suicide bombings in the north-eastern Nigerian city of Maiduguri, shattering its reputation as a relative oasis of calm in recent years as a long-running insurgency was pushed to the rural hinterlands. The post office and Monday market areas were regularly targeted by suicide bombers at the height of Nigeria’s Boko Haram insurgency, when Maiduguri was a conflict hotspot. While no group has yet claimed responsibility for the incident, Nigerian authorities said the reported bombings had been carried out by “suspected Boko Haram terrorist suicide bombers” using improvised explosive devices. Boko Haram was founded in 2002, but intensified attacks after the extrajudicial killing of its then leader, Mohammed Yusuf, in July 2009. The mosque attack happened a day before airstrikes by the US in conjunction with Nigeria against Islamic State militants in the north-west.
