Gunmen kill 20 at mosque in Nigeria

Gunmen opened fire on Muslim worshippers as they were leaving a mosque in northern Nigeria yesterday, killing at least 20 people, a local official said.
The attack happened in a remote village called Dogo Dawa, in Kaduna state, said Abdullahi Muhammad, the traditional ruler and councillor of Birnin Gwari, a local government area next door to the village.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack. Like much of northern Nigeria, Kaduna is plagued by an insurgency led by radical Islamist sect Boko Haram.
They usually attack security forces, government officials or Christians, but have hit Muslim clerics and mosques in the past, especially ones that do not follow their hardline brand of Islam.
But Abdulladhi said the attack was most likely carried out by a local criminal gang.
The Islamist insurgency in northern Nigeria and weapons flooding in from its neighbours on the threshold of the Sahara have aggravated levels of violence in the region. Armed robberies and local disputes degenerating into deadly shootouts are increasingly common across the impoverished north.