ALAGARNO , Nigeria, May 22 (UPI) -- Boko Haram militants killed at least 48 more people in overnight attacks on three Nigerian villages.
The attacks, late Tuesday and early Wednesday, came hours after bombs at a market in the city of Jos killed over 100 people.
A witness in the village of Alagarno said residents hid in bushes as the Islamic militants arrived and set fire to houses. "We saw our village up in flames, as we hid in the bush waiting for the dawn; we lost everything," she said.
Boko Haram, with its strict interpretation of Islamic law, seeks to impose an Islamic state on Nigeria, with a population of 170 million that is about 50 percent Christian. Extremist attacks have risen recently, with an estimated 2,000 people killed in Nigeria since the start of 2014. An estimated 3,600 were killed between 2010 and 2013.
A car bomb Monday killed 24 people at a bus station in the Christian area of the northern Muslim city of Kano. In April, two explosions in the capital city of Abuja killed more than 120, and last month, more than 200 schoolgirls were abducted from their school by Boko Haram militants have not been seen since.
