A Nigerian army drone strike accidently killed at least 85 civilians in a village in north-west Kaduna State, emergency officials said, in one of the country’s deadliest military bombing accidents.
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu on Tuesday ordered an investigation after the army acknowledged one of its drones accidently struck Tudun Biri village on Sunday as residents were celebrating a Muslim festival.
The army did not give any casualty figures, but local residents had said 85 people, many of them women and children, had been killed.
“The Northwest Zonal Office has received details from the local authorities that 85 dead bodies have so far been buried while search is still ongoing,” the national emergency management agency (NEMA) said in a statement.
NEMA said a further 66 people were being treated at hospital, and emergency officials were negotiating with community leaders to calm tensions in order to reach the village.
“President Tinubu describes the incident as very unfortunate, disturbing, and painful, expressing indignation and grief over the tragic loss of Nigerian lives,” the presidency said in a statement.
Nigeria’s armed forces often rely on airstrikes in their battle against so-called bandit militias in the north-west and north-east of the country, where jihadists have been fighting for more than a decade.
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