Amnesty International says more than 100 people were killed in a military attack on a market in the village of Jilli.
Published on 12 April 2026
Dozens of people are feared dead when Nigerian military aircraft struck a village market while pursuing members of the rebel group Boko Haram in the country’s northeast, according to local authorities and an international human rights group.
Amnesty International said in a post on social media on Sunday that more than 100 people were killed and 35 others were injured in the attack the previous day.
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Local chief Lawan Zanna Nur Geidam told the AFP news agency that “total casualties are around 200 dead and injured”.
The attack took place on the village of Jili in Yobe state, on the border with Borno state, the epicenter of a long-running insurgency that has left thousands dead and millions displaced.
The Nigerian Air Force said in a statement that it had killed Boko Haram fighters in an airstrike on the Jilli axis in Borno state. There was no mention of attacking the market.
The Yobe state government later said in a statement that an airstrike in the area was carried out near a market where people had come to attend.
“Some people from Geidam LGA (local government area) bordering Gubio LGA in Borno State, who had gone to the Jilli weekly market, were affected,” said Brigadier General Dahiru Abdusalam, military adviser to the Yobe state government. He did not give any further details.
The Yobe State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) said it had received initial reports of an incident at Jilli Market “which reportedly resulted in some marketers being affected” and activated emergency response.
Zanna Noor said many of the injured were taken to hospitals in nearby Geedam and Maiduguri.
A staff at Geidam General Hospital in Yobe said at least 23 people were being treated for injuries in the incident, the Associated Press news agency reported.
Amnesty International condemned the attack, saying “Launching airstrikes is not a legitimate law enforcement method by anyone’s standards. Such reckless use of deadly force is unlawful, outrageous and exposes the Nigerian military’s shocking disregard for the lives of the people it exists to protect.”
Amnesty called on Nigerian authorities to “conduct an immediate and impartial investigation into the incident and ensure that the suspected perpetrators are held accountable”.
