Gunmen kill woman, 5-year-old boy in Niger refugee camp

NIAMEY, Niger – A spokesman for the U.N. refugee agency says that a woman and a 5-year-old boy were killed when unidentified gunmen attacked a security post near a refugee camp in Niger.

Benoit Moreno says the victims of Saturday night’s attack were refugees at the Tabarey-barey camp, which houses around 10,000 refugees from Mali.

Moreno said five other civilians were hospitalized with injuries and one Niger soldier was also wounded. He said that the civilians were caught in crossfire between soldiers and the gunmen and didn’t appear to have been targeted.

It wasn’t clear on Sunday where the assailants came from. Northern and central Mali remain unstable nearly four years after France led a military intervention to drive out Islamic extremists. Attacks on security forces are common in the region.