50 die in mosque attack by teen suicide bomber

LAGOS, Nigeria — A teenage suicide bomber attacked worshipers as they gathered for morning prayers Tuesday at a mosque in northeastern Nigeria, killing at least 50 people, police said, in one of the region’s deadliest assaults in years.

Bloody debris covered the floor inside the mosque in Mubi, a town in Adamawa state, where worshipers had arrived around 5 a.m. Outside, people gathered around the dead.

President Muhammadu Buhari tweeted that he was “saddened by the very cruel and dastardly suicide bombing attack.”

“May the souls of the dead rest in peace,” he added.

Police spokesman Othman Abubakar said they were “still trying to ascertain the number of injured because they are in various hospitals.”

Though there was no immediate claim of responsibility for the bombing, suspicion immediately fell on the Boko Haram extremist group. The group is based in neighboring Borno state and has been blamed for scores of similar attacks over the years.

Tuesday’s attack was the first since Mubi was liberated from Boko Haram insurgents in 2014.

Boko Haram increasingly has been using teenagers or young women as bombers, many of whom have been abducted. The police spokesman said the young man detonated his explosives Tuesday while mingling among the worshipers. Though Nigeria’s military in recent months has flushed Boko Haram from its forest stronghold, President Buhari’s claim late last year that the extremist group had been “crushed” has proved to be premature. The suicide attacks are probably a sign that the group has been weakened and can no longer organize major assaults, military officials have said.

But in recent months, the militants appear to have regained some strength, attacking a military convoy and retaking areas security forces had once liberated.

Boko Haram has been blamed for more than 20,000 deaths during its eight-year-old insurgency. The attacks have spilled into neighboring countries and displaced more than 2.4 million people in the Lake Chad region, creating a vast humanitarian crisis.