Armed robbers kill 48 in northwest Nigeria

         
Police say armed robbers have shot and killed 48 people in a revenge attack on villagers in northwest Nigeria who have formed vigilante groups to try to end a spree of violent thefts.      

Police Commissioner Akila Usman of Zamfara state said the gunmen arrived on motorbikes Tuesday night and went from house to house in Kizara village.
                          
The gunmen searched for suspected vigilantes and shot them and their families. Usman said among the dead were the chief imam, or religious leader, as well as a man believed to be the head of the vigilante group.                 

Nigeria's Zamfara state is notorious for deadly armed robberies.           

On Tuesday, suspected Islamist militants opened fire on a school in Nigeria's northeastern city of Maiduguri, killing nine students, witnesses and a medical worker said, the second deadly attack on schools in three days.           

Witness Ibrahim Mohammed said he was taking exams in a classroom at Ansarudeen School when gunmen stormed the building, opening fire at random.         

Mortuary attendant Alhaji Baba at the State Specialists morgue in Maiduguri told Reuters he counted nine corpses come in after the attack.                

The military was not immediately available for comment.


REUTERS/AP