Armed men on Saturday killed three police officials and tried to set fire to the governor’s residence in Nigeria’s southeastern Imo state, a region where separatist tension is on the rise.
Police and Imo state spokesman Orlando Ikeokwu said Molotov cocktails had been thrown at governor Hope Uzodimma’s residence.
The assailants were prevented from setting fire to any of the buildings, he said.
However, one police officer was killed in the attack and as they fled the assailants two others, he added.
Southeast Nigeria has seen a surge in attacks targeting security forces that officials blame on the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), a separatist group seeking independence for the indigenous Igbo people.
Separatist calls for a state of Biafra in the south are a sensitive subject in Nigeria, after a unilateral declaration of independence in 1967 sparked a brutal 30-month civil war.
Source:EWN
