Police stations attacked in Nigeria

Gunmen with explosives have attacked two police stations in the northern Nigerian city of Kano, a target of Islamist group Boko Haram, killing at least four people.

Meanwhile, residents reported gunfire and blasts around another police station in the northeastern city of Damaturu, hit by deadly shootouts between suspected Islamists and security forces last week, but details were not clear.

In Kano, the Dala police station in the Goron Dutse area came under attack on Tuesday, police said.

Residents also reported explosions followed by gunfire between police and attackers around the Panshekara station on the outskirts of the city.

"We are still trying to compile details of what happened at the (Goron Dutse) police station," police spokesman Rilwanu Dutse said. "What is certain is that the police station came under bomb and gun attacks."

A police officer who was involved in the shootout said three attackers and a police corporal were killed, while another policeman was wounded. He said there were about 30 attackers.

An AFP journalist heard five explosions coming from the direction of the Goran Dutse station and saw smoke rising. The explosions later halted from that attack and no one immediately claimed them.

Boko Haram members tend to throw small, homemade IEDs in such attacks.

Details were not immediately clear from the Panshekara station. Police had not officially commented, but a police source confirmed the attack.

Kano, Nigeria's second city and the largest in the north, was the site of Boko Haram's deadliest attack yet, when coordinated bombings and shootings left at least 185 people dead in January.

The Islamist group's insurgency, concentrated in Nigeria's mainly Muslim north, has killed more than 1,000 people since mid-2009.

Security forces have frequently been the victims of its attacks, though it has continually widened its targets.

It has recently taken to attacking churches on Sundays, leading to deadly reprisal violence from Christian mobs in the city of Kaduna earlier this month and sparking fears of wider unrest.

Nigeria, Africa's most populous nation and largest oil producer, is roughly divided between a mainly Muslim north and predominantly Christian south.

On Sunday, President Goodluck Jonathan said Boko Haram was seeking to incite a religious crisis by attacking churches in an attempt to destabilise the government.