The bandits who gunned down soldiers in Kebbi State, on Tuesday, rode on over 200 motorcycles, according to a resident.
Daily Trust had reported the attack, which the state government confirmed to Minister of Foreign Affairs, Geoffrey Onyeama, who visited Kebbi over an earlier attack.
In an interview with AFP, Musa Arzika, a resident who said 13 soldiers were killed, added that the attackers came on “around 200 motorcycles riding three on each” and laid siege to the village.
AFP quoted another source as saying five policemen and a vigilante were also killed in the incident.
The battle was said to have erupted late Tuesday in Kanya, a village in Danko-Wasagu district, just a day after dozens of members of a self-defence militia were killed in the same area.
About 57 vigilantes were killed in nearby Sakaba on Monday in an ambush by bandits.
Hundreds of gunmen invaded Kanya, engaging a combined military and police detachment in a three-hour gunfight, the source and residents said.
“The death toll stands at 19. They include 13 soldiers, five policemen and one vigilante,” a security personnel, who did not want to be identified, told AFP.
He said eight other security personnel, including four soldiers, were hospitalised with wounds.
“It was an intense fight that lasted more than three hours. The terrorists had the upper hand because of their sheer number.”
Military and police did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the incident.
