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LAGOS, June 5 (Reuters) - Gunmen attacked a Catholic church in
southwest Nigeria during mass on Sunday, killing at least 50 people
including women and children, according to a hospital doctor and media
reports.

Several Nigerian news outlets said gunmen had fired at worshippers and detonated explosives at St Francis Catholic Church in the town of Owo.
The identity and motive of the attackers was not immediately clear.

The authorities have yet to give details of the attack. Funmilayo
Ibukun Odunlami, police spokesperson for Ondo state, said police would
issue a further statement soon.

"It is so sad that while the Holy Mass was going on, unknown gunmen
attacked St Francis Catholic Church...leaving many feared dead and
many others injured and the Church violated," said Catholic Church
spokesman in Nigeria, Reverend Augustine Ikwu.

Ikwu said the bishop and priests from the parish had survived the
attack unharmed.

A doctor at a hospital in Owo told Reuters that at least 50 bodies had
been brought in to two hospitals in the town from the attack. The
doctor, who declined to be named because he is not authorised to speak
to the press, also said there was a need for blood donations to treat
the injured.

President Muhammadu Buhari condemned the attack, calling it "heinous",
and the Vatican said Pope Francis was praying for the victims who had
been "painfully stricken in a moment of celebration".

Nigeria is battling an Islamist insurgency in the northeast and armed
gangs who carry out attacks and kidnappings for ransom, mostly in the northwest.

In the southwest, attacks such as this are rare. Ondo state governor
Arakunrin Oluwarotimi Akeredolu cut short a trip to the capital Abuja
and returned to Ondo after the attack. "We shall commit every
available resource to hunt down these assailants and make them pay,"
he said in a statement.

Reporting by Fikayo Owoeye in Lagos, MacDonald Dzirutwe, Camillus Eboh
and Felix Onuah in Abuja; Editing by Catherine Evans and David Holmes

https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/gunmen-kill-worshippers-during-church-service-nigeria-media-2022-06-05/

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