Bomb explodes near north Nigeria Islamic school

LAGOS, NIGERIA: Officials say a bomb detonated in northern Nigeria near an Islamic boarding school, causing unknown casualties. Yushau Shuaib, a spokesman for Nigeria's National Emergency Management Agency, said the bomb blew up Sunday morning in Zaria, a city in the far north of Kaduna state. Shuaib said there was gunfire afterward as soldiers and police arrived. Police officials could not be immediately reached for comment. No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack. A radical Islamist sect known as Boko Haram has carried out bombings and shootings throughout northern Nigeria. Kaduna state is on the ethnic and religious fault line that runs between Nigeria's predominantly Christian south and Muslim north. Ethnic and religious violence there following Nigeria's 2011 presidential election saw hundreds killed.