2 female bombers kill 58 in northeast Nigerian refugee camp

MAIDUGURI, Nigeria – Two female suicide bombers blew themselves up in a northeastern Nigerian refugee camp, killing at least 58 people, health and rescue officials said Wednesday.

A third woman bomber was arrested and gave officials information about other planned bombings that helped them increase security at the camp, said an official of the Borno State Emergency Management Agency.

Some 78 people are being treated for wounds from the twin explosions that occurred Tuesday in a camp of some 50,000 people driven from their homes by the Boko Haram Islamic uprising, according to health workers in Maiduguri, the biggest city in northeastern Nigeria. They spoke on condition of anonymity, as did rescue officials.

The emergency management official said 51 bodies were buried Wednesday in Dikwa, the scene of the carnage 53 miles northeast of Maiduguri. Health workers said five bodies were brought to the main hospital in Maiduguri. PR Nigeria, an agency that disseminates official news, Wednesday night quoted health and rescue officials putting the number of dead at 58. The officials said poor cellphone service delayed news of the attack.

Boko Haram’s 6-year-old Islamic insurgency has killed 20,000 people and made 2.5 million homeless.

In northern Cameroon, officials said two suicide bombers believed to have come from Nigeria on Wednesday killed 10 people and injured 40 attending a wake in a border village. Attacks in Chad and Niger also are blamed on Boko Haram.

Since troops from Nigeria, Chad and Cameroon last year drove the Islamic extremists from towns where they had announced an Islamic caliphate, the insurgents have taken to attacking soft targets such as mosques and marketplaces where many people gather.