“Words alone can neither express our outrage nor ease the agony of all those suffering from the constant violence in northern Nigeria,” UNICEF executive director Anthony Lake said in a statement.
“But these images of recent days and all they imply for the future of Nigeria should galvanise effective action. For this cannot go on.”
Boko Haram, which has been fighting to create a hardline Islamic state in northeast Nigeria, has in the last six months seized dozens of towns and villages in the remote region, seemingly at will.
The land grab, which has raised fears in Nigeria’s neighbours Niger, Chad and Cameroon, began soon after 276 schoolgirls were abducted from the Borno town of Chibok in mid-April.
Nine months on, 219 are still being held.
But although mass casualty attacks are not new — nearly 200 people died in Baga in 2013 — the scale, severity and frequency of the group’s assaults appears to be increasing.
On Friday, Boko Haram fought running battles with the military in the Yobe state capital, Damaturu.
– Spike in violence –
Security analysts have said more attacks were to be expected, as Nigerians go to the polls next month and the insurgents are looking to further undermine the legitimacy of the vote and the secular government.
Nigeria’s main opposition has already said that the overall result of the February 14 poll could be invalidated because tens of thousands of displaced people in the northeast will not be able to vote.
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