• At least four killed as two bombs hit Nigeria newspaper offices

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    A car destroyed by the bomb sits outside the premises of ThisDay Newspapers bombed in Abuja on Thursday.

    By Reuters

    Suicide car bombers targeted the offices of Nigerian newspaper This Day in the capital Abuja and northern city of Kaduna on Thursday, killing at least four people in apparently coordinated strikes.

    This Day is based in southern Nigeria and is broadly supportive of President Goodluck Jonathan's government - the main target for Islamist insurgent group Boko Haram, which has killed hundreds of people this year in shootings and bombings.

    There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attacks.

    At around 11 a.m. one bomber drove a jeep into the daily's office in Abuja, killing himself and two others, witnesses and the state security service (SSS) said.

    At the same time, 90 miles north in Kaduna, a car was stopped from getting into This Day's offices and one of the attackers jumped out.

    Pius Utomi Ekpei/AFP – Getty Images

    A policeman stands in front of the premises of ThisDay newspapers bombed by suicide bombers early in Abuja on Thursday.

    "He was immediately challenged by two gallant Nigerians, following which he threw the bomb at them and it detonated, killing them instantly," the SSS said in a statement.

    It identified the bomber as Umaru Mustapha, from Maiduguri in Borno state, the home of Boko Haram in the remote northeast of Africa's most populous nation.

    Thousands of Nigerians protest fuel prices, as government fears 'anarchy'

    Later in the day, authorities reported another explosion in Kaduna. There were no further details.

    Boko Haram, whose name in the Hausa language means "Western education is sinful", has not previously targeted the press in its bombings. Last October, the sect killed a reporter for state-run television who it said was an informant.

    Pius Utomi Ekpei/AFP – Getty Images

    Police officers scan debris of the engine of the Jeep used to bomb newspaper offices in Abuja, Thursday.

    Boko Haram has been fighting a low level insurgency for more than two years and has become the main security menace in Africa's top oil producer. Most attacks have been in the largely Muslim north, well away from the southern oil fields.

    This Day angered Muslims a decade ago when one of its columnists suggested the Prophet Mohammad might have wanted to marry a beauty queen. At least 100 people were killed in ensuing riots.

    "Horrendous and wicked"
    President Jonathan, in Ivory Coast for talks with other West African leaders on a crisis in Mali, said in a statement the attacks on This Day were "misguided, horrendous and wicked."

    "The President urged media practitioners not to be dissuaded from carrying out their fearless campaign for peace, justice and equity, as democracy cannot flourish without press freedom," the statement from his media adviser said.

    At least 27 lay dead at a Christian church in Nigeria after a bombing there that was part of a wave of blasts across the country  on Christmas Day. An Islamist group claimed credit. NBC's Rohit Kachroo reports.

    In August last year, Boko Haram carried out a suicide car bombing at the United Nations building in Abuja that killed 25 people and prompted a ramp-up in security measures.

    At the scene of the Abuja blast on Thursday, sirens wailed as police and fire fighters rushed in. Smoke billowed from the building, whose windows were all smashed.

    Soldiers and police cordoned off the area, while emergency workers evacuated wounded on stretchers to waiting ambulances.

    "The suicide bomber came in a jeep and rammed a vehicle into the gate," said Olusegun Adeniyi, chairman of the This Day editorial board. "Two of our security men died, and obviously the suicide bomber died too."

    This Day's publisher, Nduka Obaigbena, is a celebrity in Nigeria and puts on music, art and fashion events in cities in around the world.

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  • Car bomb strikes UN building in Nigeria's capital

    The AP reports from ABUJA, Nigeria:

     A car laden with explosives detonated outside the United Nations' main office in Nigeria's capital Friday, flattening one wing of the building and killing an undetermined number of people.

    Witnesses said the sedan drove through one of the U.N. compound's gates and made its way close to the four-story building before the explosion.

    "I saw scattered bodies," said Michael Ofilaje, a UNICEF worker at the building. "Many people are dead." Continue reading.

     

    Saharareporters via AP

    Firefighters and rescue workers are seen after a large explosion struck the United Nations' main office in Nigeria's capital Abuja on Aug. 26, flattening one wing of the building and killing several people. A U.N. official in Geneva called it a bomb attack. The building, located in the same neighborhood as the U.S. embassy and other diplomatic posts in Abuja, had a huge hole punched in it.

    Saharareporters via AP

    An injured man being stretchered down a ladder by firefighters after a large explosion struck the United Nations' main office in Nigeria's capital Abuja on Aug. 26.

     

  • Afolabi Sotunde / Reuters

    People carry containers as they queue to buy kerosene at a fuel station in Nigeria's capital Abuja on Thursday, August 11.

    Chaotic queue at fuel station during kerosene shortage in Nigeria

    According to Reuters, Nigeria has been facing a kerosene shortage since late May, with Abuja and Lagos being some of the affected cities, according to local media reports.

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  • Afolabi Sotunde / Reuters

    Members of the emergency services work at the scene of an explosion at a police station after a suspected suicide bomber was killed and many vehicles were destroyed in Nigeria's capital Abuja on Thursday, June 16. A suicide bomber died in the incident and many vehicles were destroyed," a spokesman for NEMA told Reuters.

    Police blame Muslim sect for Nigeria suicide bomb

    The AP reports:

    ABUJA, Nigeria — A suicide bombing blamed on radical Islamist militants killed at least two people in the parking lot of police headquarters in Nigeria's capital Thursday, police said.

    Olusola Amore, national police spokesman, said police blame the radical Muslim sect locally known as Boko Haram.

    "They have been issuing threat upon threat," Amore said. Continue reading.