They came to the village of Naridon just before midnight. Gunmen slipped into the farming settlement in Nigeria’s Kaduna State at around 11 p.m. on July 26 and began firing into homes where families were already asleep.
The attackers torched houses behind them as residents ran into the nearby fields and bush in the dark; eight children were among at least 30 people killed before the night was over.
Barnabas Aid and other groups monitoring the region say the gunfire continued into early morning with no security response ever reaching the village. What was left were multiple homes and shops burned to the ground.
One family lost five children in a single night; the sole survivor is now critically injured and fighting to live. Local monitoring group Truth Nigeria puts the real toll from coordinated attacks in the area above 60. A Nigerian Army post sat just a few miles off but never sent help while the attack was underway, and residents say the same community was hit in a similar raid around the same time last year.
Funeral services for 27 of the victims were held August 1 at a Catholic Mass in Kafanchan attended by thousands of mourners.
Chillingly, the slaughter at Naridon was not an isolated incident.
