NIAMEY: At least 18 people were killed and 100 homes torched in an attack in the dead of night by Nigeria's Boko Haram fighters on a village in southeastern Niger, local authorities said on Thursday.

"The toll is 18 dead, 11 hurt, almost 100 homes burned down" in the village of Wogom late Wednesday, the mayor of the nearby town of Bosso, Bako Mamadou, told AFP.

A humanitarian worker said the militants came from Nigeria and crossed the Komadougou Yobe river, the border between Niger and Nigeria.

Armed militants and suicide bombers from Nigeria's Boko Haram group have staged repeated attacks since February in Niger's southeast Diffa region near Nigeria, leaving hundreds of people dead.

The United Nations has registered around 50 attacks and clashes between rebel fighters and Niger troops since February.

The last came in late October when they shot dead 13 people in a village near Diffa.

Some 150 schools with more than 12,000 pupils have been forced to close due to the attacks in the southeast.

This week Africa's prime fashion event, the FIMA festival in the capital Niamey, was called off on the eve of its launch over fears of terror attacks.

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