An explosion in Nigeria’s Kwara state kills at least 1 person, police say

ILORIN, Nigeria (AP) — An explosion killed at least one person and injured an unspecified number of people Monday in Nigeria’s north-central Kwara state, police said, in the latest attack in an area where Muslim militants have been increasingly active.

The explosion, believed to have been from an improvised explosive device, went off in the early morning in a village near Woro in the Kaiama district, in an area where an armed group slaughtered more than 160 people in February.

Police spokesperson Toun Ejire-Adeyemi in Kwara state told The Associated Press an investigation into the explosion has been launched. The blast struck a commercial vehicle that was heading to neighboring Niger state, she said.

No group has claimed responsibility for the attack. However, the state has become a new frontier of expansion by various Islamist groups who are pushing southward in the country’s escalating security crisis. Nigerian President Bola Tinubu deployed the military to the area following the attack in February.

“This is another trauma again because people are afraid. Likely, some people will leave the community again,” village head Umar Bio Salihu said.

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Islamist groups have recently launched a wave of attacks on communities and military installations in the northern region, often overrunning military camps in what experts say is a campaign to weaken the military’s response to attacks by the groups.

Earlier in the year, the United States sent troops to help train the Nigerian military in its fight against the armed groups.

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Associated Press writer Dyepkazah Shibayan in Abuja contributed to this report.