Dozens of students killed in Nigerian school

In this photo taken Thursday, Feb, 20. 2014, burnt out cars are seen after an attack by Boko Haram in Bama, Nigeria. The latest attack by suspected Islamic extremists in Nigeria’s northeast has left 115 people dead, more than 1,500 buildings razed and some 400 vehicles destroyed, witnesses said Thursday, as a traditional ruler accused the military of being scared to confront the militants. Sitting amid the smoking ruins of his palace, the shehu, or king, of Bama, Kyari Ibn Elkanemi, charged that the government “is not serious” about halting the Islamic uprising in a region covering one-sixth of the country, far from oil fields that make Nigeria Africa’s biggest petroleum producer. AP

YOLA, Nigeria—Suspected Islamic militants killed dozens of students in a predawn attack on a northeast Nigerian college, survivors say, setting ablaze a locked hostel and shooting and slitting the throats of those who escaped through windows. Some were burned alive.

Adamu Garba said he and other teachers estimate 40 students died in the assault that began around 2 a.m. Tuesday at the Federal Government College Buni Yadi.

Military spokesman Captain Eli Lazarus said soldiers still are gathering corpses so he could not give an exact toll.

It is the latest in a string of attacks blamed on Boko Haram—the name means Western education is forbidden—that has caused regional officials to charge the military is losing its war to halt an Islamic uprising in Africa’s biggest oil producer.

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