Nigeria’s military mistakenly bombed a refugee camp Tuesday, killing more than 100 people and leaving 46 others “severely injured,” the Associated Press reported Wednesday.
A government official said more than 100 refugees and aid workers died in what the United Nations called a “truly catastrophic” incident. The Red Cross called Wednesday for urgent action to be taken for the 46 wounded people at the refugee camp, in an area the organization said is still under threat from Boko Haram extremists.
In a rare move, the Nigerian military acknowledged that it had bombed the camp by mistake, saying it had been targeting Boko Haram fighters in the area. The camp in Rann was housing about 43,000 people who had fled the terrorist group. Alfred Davies, a field coordinator for Doctors Without Borders, offered disturbing firsthand details of the tragedy in a piece for Time magazine.
Davies wrote that “the first bomb fell at 12:30 p.m. and landed just a few meters away from the Red Cross office. The plane circled back around, and it dropped a second bomb five minutes later.” Authorities have warned that the death toll is likely to rise.