Attachments
By Chiara Torelli on 6 Dec 2023
Late on Sunday 3 December, villagers gathered in Tudun Biri to celebrate Maulud, the birthday of the Prophet Muhammad. A military drone on a routine counterterrorism operation mistook their movement patterns for those of bandits, and an airstrike was called in.
85 people have been buried, while up to 66 were injured in the strike, which came in two parts: the first strike hit the venue, while the second targeted people responding to the attack.
While Nigerian military leadership initially denied the air strike, they later confirmed that security forces mistook the civilians for militants. President Bola Tinubu has ordered a thorough investigation of the incident.
As has been widely documented, this is not the first time civilians have been killed and injured in Nigerian air strikes targeting armed groups. Since 2010, AOAV has recorded 83 airstrikes carried out by the Nigerian Air Force (NAF) in the country, 14 of which have killed 399 civilians and injured 310. Air strikes are the second most injurious explosive weapon to civilians in Nigeria after improvised explosive devices, which have caused 89% (9,649) of civilian casualties from explosive weapons in the country since 2010, across 439 incidents.
Borno and Kaduna are the most affected states for such attacks, with 376 civilians killed and injured in NAF air strikes in Borno, and 160 in Kaduna. Other states where civilians have been harmed in NAF strikes are Zamfara (82 civilian casualties), Adamawa (35), Yobe (32), Katsina (14), Niger (6), and Nasarawa (4).
While villages account for the majority of NAF strikes which have resulted in civilian harm, causing 242 civilian casualties across 9 incidents (168 killed, 74 injured), one strike on an IDP camp in 2017 caused 285 civilian casualties (115 killed, 170 injured). Other affected locations include public gatherings (152 civilian casualties), and agricultural lands (24).
Overall, AOAV has recorded 559 incidents of explosive weapons use in Nigeria since 2010, killing 4,455 civilians and injuring 6,407. So far, 2023 is the most injurious year for civilians in Nigeria since 2018, with 60 incidents of explosive weapons use resulting in 336 reported civilian casualties. In 2022, Nigeria witnessed the highest levels of civilian harm from explosive weapons since 2018, predominantly due the increased activity of non-state actors in Nigeria: incidents of explosive weapon use by non-state actors rose by 138% in 2022, from 13 to 31 incidents, with Boko Haram and Islamic State’s affiliate in Nigeria, Islamic State-West Africa Province (ISWAP), as the main known perpetrators. Overall, 200 civilian casualties were attributed to non-state actors last year.
Possibly in response to this, state-perpetrated incidents of explosive violence also increased significantly, rising by 278% from 9 to 34, with reported civilian casualties of such attacks increasing from 58 to 96. Reflecting this status quo, IEDs caused the majority, 59% (176), of civilian casualties in 2022, while air-launched weapons caused 33% (100).
AOAV’s casualty figures represent the lowest of estimations in terms of the number of people killed and injured by explosive weapon use. In an effort to quantify the explicit harm caused by specific explosive weapons, AOAV solely records incident-specific casualty figures, as reported in English-language media.