Explosion kills four children in northeast Nigeria

Reuters

17 June 2011

Explosion kills four children in northeast Nigeria

MAIDUGURI, Nigeria (Reuters) - An explosion near a church killed four children in Nigeria's northeastern state of Borno on Thursday, a region which has been beset by attacks by a radical Islamist sect, police said.

The blast in the town of Damboa, around 90 km (56 miles) south of the state capital Maiduguri, came just hours after a suspected suicide bomber detonated explosives outside the national police headquarters in the capital Abuja.

"The children were playing in a compound near the church when the blast went off, killing the four and wounding another," Borno state police commissioner Jinjiri Abubakar told Reuters, adding that the blast appeared to have been caused by a bomb.