At least 30 killed in attack on Kasuwan-Daji village in Nigeria

Nigerian authorities said gunmen violently attacked a village in Nigeria’s Niger state, killing at least 30 people and looting shops.

The attackers emerged from a forest near the village of Kasuwandazi on Saturday and set fire to a local market, looted shops and kidnapped an unspecified number of people, police said.

A local journalist told the BBC’s Hausa Service: “The gunmen entered the village on motorcycles armed with weapons, seized people and massacred them while others were shot dead.”

Attacks and kidnappings by armed criminal gangs known as bandits have been a problem in Nigeria for years, but there has been a recent surge in reports in western and central regions.

Abdullahi Rofia, an official at Niger State’s disaster management agency, confirmed journalists’ reports that villagers had been captured and killed.

He told the BBC that local residents were terrified. “They are in hiding and too scared to talk to anyone.

“They’re afraid that if you say something, they’ll turn around and do the same to you.”

Niger State police spokesman Wasiu Abiodun said emergency teams had been deployed to help the injured and security forces were working to rescue those kidnapped.

Some argue that it is illegal to pay ransom to criminal groups classified by the government as terrorists, but this is often ignored.

A witness to the attack told BBC Hausa that there were no security forces in the village.

“We want the government to help us. In the past, we heard about this problem elsewhere, but now it is happening in our village too,” he said.

Fear is driving people out of the homes where they were born and raised.

“We are dying like chickens and the government is worried about us?

“The government is listening and seeing what’s happening, but they’re not doing anything about it. What can we as ordinary people do?”