MAIDUGURI, Nigeria, April 22 (Reuters) - Suspected Boko Haram militants riding motorbikes stormed two villages in northeast Nigeria, killing at least 20 people, a local official said on Wednesday.
The assaults are part of a surge by Boko Haram and its Islamic State splinter ISWAP, who have stepped up deadly attacks on military bases and villages in Nigeria's insurgency-hit northeast.
The gunmen raided the villages of Pubagu and Mayo-Ladde in the states of Borno and neighbouring Adamawa, respectively, on Tuesday afternoon after overwhelming local vigilantes, said Mada Saidu, chairman of Askira-Uba district, where one of the attacks occurred.
At least 11 people were killed in Pubagu and nine in Mayo-Ladde. Homes and shops were torched and food supplies looted, Saidu said.
Islamist militants have waged a 17-year insurgency seeking to carve out an Islamic state in northeast Nigeria, killing thousands and displacing at least 2 million people, aid groups say, despite major military campaigns to root them out.
(Reporting Adewale Kolawole in Maiduguri; Writing by Elisha Bala-GbogboEditing by Gareth Jones)
