Six suspected members of Nigeria’s Islamist group Boko Haram pleaded innocent Friday to charges of engaging in a recent string of deadly bombings near the Nigerian capital.
In an Abuja high court, the six were hit with a five count charge of throwing bombs in and around the federal capital between March and May.
Eight suspects were charged with similar offences before a (lower) magistrate court in Abuja on September 13.
It is not clear if these six suspects were part of the group of eight that appeared before the lower court. That court declined jurisdiction to try such a case.
They were accused of being behind separate attacks between March and May in which 24 people were killed, including three security officers.
The attacks took place in Suleija town, a village near Bwari, and Azare — all near Abuja.
The worst of the attacks was on the eve of parliamentary elections in April, when a bomb rocked a local election office, killing 16 people, mainly recent graduates hired as election officials.
They were alleged to have committed acts of terrorism by causing death through detonation of improvised explosive devices.
The suspects were also accused of training some persons, now at large, in the use of arms and ammunition and the preparation, planting and detonation of improvised explosive devices for the purpose of terrorism.
They face life imprisonment on conviction.
Judge Bilkisu Aliyu adjourned the case until October 20 when the trial will commence.
The Boko Haram sect has been blamed for scores of shootings and bomb attacks, mostly in Nigeria’s northeast.
The group claimed responsibility for the bombing of UN headquarters in Abuja on August 26 that killed at least 23 people.
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