Nigeria: 500 People Killed in One Week

Terrorist attacks, lynchings, bus crashes, burnings, boating accidents, a deadly stampede of job seekers attending a recruitment event: it's been a bloody and chaotic week even by Nigeria's standards. Resulting in 500 deaths.

Monday

Armed attackers, set upon avenging the deaths of 13 people at an earlier confrontation, took aim at Taraba residents, according to local officials. Many fled their houses, which were then burnt down in the onslaught.

Tuesday

At least 13 hapless Nigerians lost their lives due to a boat capsizing in southwest Lagos State. The National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) told Xinhua that five passengers of the boat were rescued and six other people remained missing.

Tribal attacks claimed the lives of 117 residents (included women and children) from four villages across the north-western state of Katsina. Some 37 people were reportedly injured in the violence, while 708 residents where displaced.

Friday

At least 212 people lost their lives in a gunfire between rebels and military operatives last Friday. Sources said at least five soldiers, among them a woman, were killed in the gun fighting.

Boko Haram fighters are believed to be behind the attack. The fighters, allegedly dressed in the uniforms of military personnel, stormed the area in vehicles disguised as an army convoy.

Civilians attempted to repel the attacks; security agents arrived at the scene and a number of the Boko Haram fighters were arrested and handed over to the military. Those who tried to fight back were lynched, according to a rebel identified as Isa Maikati.

Also on Friday, in north west Nigeria's Jigawa State, nine unlucky people were killed and seven seriously injured when two buses collided. Six of those killed were burnt beyond recognition, according to sources. A preliminary investigation said the buses had broached the speed limit.

Saturday

At least 16 job-hungry Nigerians lost their lives during a recruitment event that turned into a deadly stampede. Nigeria's interior minister Abba Moro refused to step down, after he blamed the frenzied job-seekers for their own deaths.

Another series of probable Boko Haram attacks, reported late Friday and early Saturday, left about 100 people dead across three villages in the southern part of the state.

Residents said that some 40 attackers killed more than 50 people in one of the villages. Many houses were also burnt in the bloody rampage. People were gunned down as they tried to escape the attackers, according to residents.