Girl beaten to death by Nigerian crowd after she was accused of being a suicide bomber

Local police say the girl was unlikely to have been guilty

Nigerian police in Bauchi (Getty)

A teenage girl has been beaten to death by a crowd in Nigeria after she was accused of being a suicide bomber.

Local police said the girl was unlikely to have been a suicide bomber because she did not detonate any explosives when she was attacked.

Police deputy superintendent Mohammad Haruna described the girl as the victim of "mob action carried out by an irate crowd."

The attack took place at Muda Lawal, the biggest market in Bauchi city in the northeast of the country.

The teenager was with another girl of a similar age when the attack happened.

The pair aroused suspicion by refusing to be searched when they arrive at the gate of the market, local yam vendor Mohd Adamu told the Associated Press news agency.

One of the girls was found to have two bottles strapped to her body after the crowd assaulted her, and she was beaten to death. Her body was burnt with a petrol-doused tyre.

The other girl was detained by police.

There has been a spate of suicide bombings in Nigera by the Islamist militant group Boko Haram.

Girls as young as ten years old have been used to carry explosives into public areas, which are then detonated.

People gather to look at a burnt vehicle following a bomb explosion that rocked the busiest roundabout near the crowded Market in Maiduguri, Borno State on 1 July 2014

It is not clear from previous attacks whether the children detonate the explosives themselves or whether it is done remotely.

A multi-national military force has assembled on border town in the region to stop Boko Haram attacks spilling over onto Nigeria’s neighbours.

Around 10,000 people died in Nigeria last year from violence related to Boko Haram, according to the US Council on Foreign Relations. 1.5m have been displaced from their homes.

Nigeria suspended its elections after the country’s electoral commission warned that voters could not be kept safe from attacks on polling stations by the group.