Bandits kill at least 70 security volunteers in Nigeria ambush

BAUCHI (Reuters): Bandits killed at least 70 community security volunteers in an ambush in violence-ridden Plateau state in central Nigeria, residents and a volunteer leader said on Wednesday.

Volunteer leader Aliyu Baffa said the ambush occurred around 1300 GMT on Monday near the Kukawa and Bunyun communities in the Kanam district as hundreds of volunteers were heading to Madam Forest, a known hideout of heavily armed bandits.

Baffa said more than 70 volunteers were killed and that more bodies might be recovered. Over 60 were buried in Kukawa alone, he said by phone.

Musa Ibrahim, a resident of Bunyun, corroborated the incident, reporting that the bandits also killed 10 security volunteers in his community and burned down several houses.

The ambush underscored a surge in factional bloodshed, often involving Islamist militias or criminal gangs, across Africa’s most populous country in recent months, with 2,266 people killed in the first half of 2025.

Plateau police could not be immediately reached for comment.