KANO   -  A bomb exploded in a teahouse in a village in northeast Nigeria, killing 19 people and wounding two dozen more in the second major attack in a few weeks, security sources said on Thursday.

The Wednesday night blast in Kawuri village in Borno State was one of the deadliest in recent years in northeast Nigeria, where violence from a grinding militants conflict has been on the decline.

“There was an explosion at a tea joint in Kawuri around 8:00 pm yesterday. We have recovered 19 dead bodies and 27 injured,” Ibrahim Liman, a member of an anti-militants militia that works with the army, told AFP.  Two other militiamen confirmed the toll in Kawuri, around 50 kilometres from the state capital Maiduguri.

The attack came just weeks after multiple suicide attackers killed 32 people in Borno State’s Gwoza area when they targeted a wedding, a hospital and a funeral. No group has claimed responsibility for Wednesday’s blast or the Gwoza attacks.