Fresh Nigerian shooting kills 20

A fresh shooting attack from a Muslim sect had claimed 20 lives in northeast Nigeria on Friday, a local police officer has said.

The attack came as a spate of sect shooting and bombing attacks in the country's north over the past weeks.

The attack, which happened in Mubi in Adamawa state, had targeted a hall where a group of Igbo traders were meeting, the state police commissioner Ade T. Shinaba told local media.

He blamed the radical sect known as Boko Haram for the killing.

Two persons have been killed and three others wounded by unidentified gunmen in motorbikes in Mubi on Thursday evening and the Igbos were meeting to handle their corpses, according to local residents.

The attack came barely few days after a state of emergency was announced by the Nigerian government in some parts of Borno, Yobe, Niger and Plateau States. Adamawa was not listed among the flashpoint states.

Spokesperson of the Boko Haram sect Abu Qaqa on Sunday issued a three-day ultimatum to non Muslims and residents from the southern states of Nigeria living in north of the West African country to vacate the area or face the wrath of the group.

Boko Haram is apparently responding to the state of emergency declared on Saturday by Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan.

Boko Haram launched the first attack in Maiduguri in July 2009, during which many were killed and wounded with property destroyed. The sect's leader known as Yusuf and his alleged financier Buji Foi were killed in a counter-attack by the security operative.

More than 800 people including security personnel have been killed in violence linked to suspected Boko Haram militants.

The frequent spate of violent attacks especially on innocent souls in north Nigeria is worrisome, partly for its reflection of the dastard state of insecurity in the land.