4 dead after gunmen attack US convoy in Nigeria: NPR

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ABUJA, Nigeria Gunmen targeted a convoy of US embassy staff in southeastern Nigeria on Tuesday, killing two of its local staff and two police officers, police said.

The attackers opened fire on the convoy along a main road in Ogbaru local government area in Anambra state, one of the epicenters of separatist violence in the region, police said. “The thugs murdered two of the Police Mobile Force members and two consulate staff, and set fire to their bodies and vehicles,” said Tochukwu Ikenga, police spokesman at Anambra.

A joint security force team was deployed to the scene but only arrived after the assailants fled with two other police officers and one of the drivers, Ikenga added. He said no US citizens were on the trip.

The US State Department said its personnel in Nigeria were working with the country’s security agencies to investigate Tuesday’s attack. “The safety of our personnel is always paramount, and we take great precautions when arranging field trips,” the State Department said in a statement.

It is not immediately clear the nature of the trip undertaken by the US Embassy staff members in Anambra, or how many were in the convoy. Ikenga said it was regrettable that “a convoy of such or any kindred enters the state without recourse to the police of the area or any security agency.”

The attack in the town of Atani, located 60 kilometers (37 miles) from the state capital, has further raised concerns about the safety of residents and travelers amid separatist violence that has swirled widespread in the southeastern region of Nigeria in recent years.

Authorities have blamed the violence on a separatist group known as the Indigenous People of Biafra, who are campaigning for the region to secede from the West African nation to form an independent country. Separatists have grown more violent in recent years as they continue to demand a referendum and since the trial of its leader Nnamdi Kanu on terrorism charges.

Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari has rejected calls for a referendum, insisting that the unity of Africa’s most populous country and the continent’s largest economy is non-negotiable.

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