Gunmen kill nearly 200 people in Nigeria’s Kwara and Katsina states.

Gunmen have killed nearly 200 people in western and northern Nigeria, officials and residents say, as survivors buried the dead and security forces hunted the attackers.

Nigeria’s President Bola Ahmed Tinubu announced the deployment of an army battalion to the western state of Kwara, after gunmen stormed the community of Woro on Tuesday evening, killing at least 170 people. A further 21 people were killed in a separate attack in the city of Katsina in northern Nigeria, with gunmen murdering people as they moved from house to house.

In a statement published on social media late on Wednesday, Tinubu said the military command would spearhead the effort, codenamed Operation Savannah Shield, “to checkmate the barbaric terrorists and protect defenceless communities”.

He condemned the attack as “cowardly and barbaric”, saying the gunmen targeted villagers who had rejected attempts to impose hardline rule.

“It is commendable that community members, even ‌though Muslims, refused to be conscripted into a belief that promotes violence over peace,” Tinubu said in a ‌statement.

Although no group has claimed responsibility, residents told the Reuters news agency the attackers were religious hardliners who had long preached in the village, urging locals to abandon the Nigerian state.

The state government blamed “terrorist cells”, and Tinubu and locals blamed the attack on Boko Haram.