{"id":28980,"date":"2026-03-17T13:04:02","date_gmt":"2026-03-17T11:04:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/?post_type=news&#038;p=28980"},"modified":"2026-03-17T13:04:02","modified_gmt":"2026-03-17T11:04:02","slug":"suspected-suicide-attacks-kill-at-least-23-in-nigerias-maiduguri","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/suspected-suicide-attacks-kill-at-least-23-in-nigerias-maiduguri\/","title":{"rendered":"Suspected suicide attacks kill at least 23 in Nigeria&#8217;s Maiduguri"},"content":{"rendered":"<div data-olk-copy-source=\"MessageBody\">At least 23 people were killed and 108 \u200cinjured in suspected multiple suicide-bomb attacks in Maiduguri city, capital of Nigeria&#8217;s insurgency-hit northeastern state of Borno, the state police command said in a statement late on Monday.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Borno is at the heart \u200bof Nigeria&#8217;s Islamist insurgency for the past 17 years, which has claimed \u200bthousands of lives and displaced 2 million people.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The first blast went \u2060off at a post office in the city centre and was immediately followed by \u200banother at the popular Monday market nearby, two security sources and three Maiduguri residents \u200btold\u00a0Reuters\u00a0on Monday.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>One blast hit the University of Maiduguri Teaching Hospital, and another struck the eastern neighbourhood of Kaleri, all in the early evening of Monday.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>&#8220;Preliminary investigation reveals that the incidents were \u200bcarried out by suspected suicide bombers,&#8221; the state police said in the statement, without \u200bsaying who was responsible.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Police said normalcy had been restored and security forces had tightened patrols across \u200cthe city \u2060to prevent further attacks, adding that an investigation into the circumstances of the attack was underway.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Security analysts said the attacks had the hallmarks of insurgent group Boko Haram, which together with Islamic State West Africa Province, has been escalating attacks against \u200bthe Nigerian military in \u200bBorno.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Maiduguri is among \u2060the safest cities in Borno state but at least five worshippers were killed and 35 others injured on Christmas Eve last \u200byear when a suspected suicide bomber detonated an explosive inside a \u200bmosque.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Besides the \u2060insurgency in the northeast, jihadists have also been expanding in the northwest of the country, where bandit gangs have caused havoc through kidnappings and attacks on communities and schools.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The \u2060United States \u200bcarried out air strikes in Nigeria&#8217;s northwest in December \u200band has begun deploying a small number of troops to train Nigerian forces confronting militants.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>&#8211;Reuters&#8211;<\/div>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":14609,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"news-type":[78,26],"class_list":["post-28980","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-featured","news-type-general_news","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"","published_date":"","news_description":"Twenty three killed in suspected multiple suicide-bomb attacks in Nigeria","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/28980","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/28980\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28981,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/28980\/revisions\/28981"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14609"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28980"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=28980"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}