By Felix Onuah
ABUJA (Reuters) – Nigerian police said two of its officers were killed and three left unconscious after an attack involving knives and explosives by the Islamic Movement of Nigeria in capital Abuja on Sunday.
“The proscribed organisation attacked the police checkpoint unprovoked, wielding machetes, improvised explosive devices and knives,” police spokesperson Josephine Adeh said in a statement.
Police vans were also burned in the attack, the statement said.
The Shi’ite group was banned by Nigeria in 2019 after violent protests demanding the release of its jailed leader.
Nigeria’s army accused the group of wanting to assassinate a former chief of army staff and it allegedly retaliated, killing more than 300 of the group’s members in 2015, and its leader, El Zakazy, was imprisoned from 2015 till 2021.
(Writing by Ope Adetayo; Editing by Bernadette Baum)
