Dozens of Fulani herders have been killed in a cross-border security operation involving Nigerian state-backed militias, local vigilantes and, according to community sources, armed groups from neighbouring Benin along the Niger–Benin frontier.

Residents and community leaders around Kabe, in Nigeria’s Borgu area near the Benin border, said vigilantes from Bussa district led door-to-door raids on Fulani herding settlements, accusing residents of acting as informants for Ansaru, an al-Qaeda-linked jihadist faction.

Witnesses described a coordinated sweep in which armed men, accompanied by Nigerian soldiers, stormed hamlets at dawn, rounding up young Fulani men. Those who resisted arrest were shot on the spot, according to multiple accounts gathered from the area.

“Security personnel killed 41 suspected Ansaru informants in the raids in which many others were arrested,” said Ahmad Ali, a community leader from the nearby village of Konkoso. He said the operation brought together local vigilantes and counterparts from Benin “with the help of Nigerian soldiers.”

A humanitarian worker assisting displaced families in the region gave a slightly lower death toll of 38 but also blamed “vigilantes from Nigeria and Benin” for what he described as a massacre that emptied entire herding communities.

The Nigerian military has not confirmed the operation. A spokesman declined to comment, saying only that he would seek further details. In Benin, military authorities did not respond to requests for clarification on whether their forces were aware of, or involved in, the cross-border action.

Niger state and its border districts have become a convergence point for criminal “bandit” gangs and jihadist factions expanding from Nigeria’s northeast and the wider Sahel. Analysts say loose alliances between rustlers, kidnappers and Islamist fighters have deepened mistrust between settled farmers and largely nomadic Fulani herders, who are frequently profiled as collaborators.

Across the Sahel, Fulani communities have faced collective punishment from security forces and ethnic militias after jihadist attacks, a pattern researchers warn can drive more young men into the arms of extremist groups for protection or revenge.

In the Kabe area, residents said tensions spiked after two Fulani men accused of spying for Ansaru were killed in Sabalunna. In retaliation, Ansaru fighters reportedly attacked and burned the community, vowing to avenge any further killings of their sympathisers.

A Kabe resident, Abubakar, said some herders then threatened to disrupt the coming farming season by attacking farmers in their fields. “This prompted the pre-emptive raid,” he said, confirming that Fulani settlements have since been abandoned as families fled with their cattle into the bush or across the border.