Boko Haram attacks Nigerian school
POTISKUM, Nigeria — Suspected Boko Haram extremists attacked a business school in northeast Nigeria on Friday with gunfire and two bomb blasts before being overcome by security forces.
A suicide bomber died when he blew himself up prematurely in the parking lot of the College of Administrative and Business Studies in Potiskum, according to a security officer and a hospital worker. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to reporters. Potiskum is the biggest city in Yobe state.
A second bomb exploded in the college dormitory, but all the students apparently were already in classrooms.
Five students were wounded by gunfire and another 45 people are being treated for injuries suffered as they jumped out of windows and over walls to escape the attackers, the hospital worker said.
Those injured include schoolchildren from the neighboring Government Science Secondary School.
Military and police spokesmen did not immediately respond to requests for information.
Over protests, Burundian runs again
BUJUMBURA, Burundi — Burundi’s leader registered Friday as a presidential candidate with the country’s electoral commission despite nearly two weeks of deadly street protests in the capital opposing his bid to seek a third term.
With international alarm over the growing unrest in the central African nation, a U.N. envoy suggested that conditions were not right for an election. The United States said it was prepared to take “targeted measures,” including sanctions, against those linked to the violence.
At least 13 people have died and 216 have been wounded in protests since April 25, when the ruling party announced it had nominated President Pierre Nkurunziza as its presidential candidate. Protesters pelted police removing barricades from roads Friday, but the army moved in and contained the violence.
Burundi’s June 26 election should go on because most of the country is peaceful, Nkurunziza told reporters after submitting his documents Friday to the electoral commission. Still, more than 50,000 Burundians have fled to neighboring countries because they fear violence ahead of the elections, the U.N. refugee agency said.
Australians arrest teen in bomb plot
CANBERRA, Australia -- Police arrested a 17-year-old and accused him of plotting to detonate three homemade bombs in the Australian city of Melbourne, officials said Saturday.
The teen was arrested Friday afternoon in a joint federal-state police counterterrorism operation at his home in the upmarket suburb of Greenvale, where the explosive devices were found, Australian Federal Police Deputy Commissioner Mike Phelan said. The bomb squad rendered the devices safe, he said.
Melbourne is Australia's second-largest city and is the capital of Victoria state.
"We've got to examine lot of material that was seized at the premises, sift through a lot of intelligence, we have to get the full picture. So, we may not know exactly where it was going to occur nor when it was exactly going to occur, but let me tell you something was going to happen," Phelan told reporters.
He added: "As a result of the Victoria police and AFP interception yesterday, some Victorians are going to be alive because of it. Had we not intervened, there was a real threat of action being taken."
The suspect will appear in the Melbourne Children's Court on Monday on terrorism charges. His identity cannot be revealed for legal reasons.
Iraq recruits 1st 1,000 in Sunni militia
AMIRIYAT FALLUJAH, Iraq — Iraqi authorities on Friday signed up the first batch of 1,000 recruits for a new Sunni militia to help its security forces take back the western Anbar province from the Islamic State, after years of reluctance to arm and train the tribal fighters.
The newly appointed governor of Anbar province, Souhaib al-Ani, told the recruits that it was the start of the liberation of the province, an estimated 65 percent of which has been under control of the Islamic State for the past year and a half.
“Today is not like any other day: Today is the beginning of the end for those who have wreaked havoc on our homes,” al-Ani told the recruits before an audience of military and tribal leaders.
“This is not like any other day because all of Iraq stands with you,” he added, speaking at the ceremony in the town of Amiriyat Fallujah, a few miles south of the main militant-stronghold in Anbar, the city of Fallujah.
Anbar’s Sunni tribes were key to defeating al-Qaida in 2006 but afterwards, the Shiite-dominated government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki cut funding to these Sunni forces. Many were later targeted and killed when the Islamic State swept into the province.