More than 60 women and children have been abducted in northern Nigeria by suspected militant Islamists, residents and officials say.

The abductions are said to have taken place during a series of raids over the past week on villages in Borno state.

Dozens of people were killed in the attacks, and people have been fleeing the villages, a BBC reporter says.

The Islamist group Boko Haram is still holding more than 200 girls it captured in Borno’s Chibok town on 14 April.

Boko Haram is demanding the release of its fighters and their relatives, in exchange for the girls. The government has rejected this.

BBC Nigeria correspondent Will Ross says the latest abductions do not come as a
surprise.

Many remote villages in north-eastern Nigeria are extremely insecure and when Boko
Haram fighters attack, they often spend hours looting and killing, he says.

The abductions took place in the Damboa area, close to Maiduguri, the capital of Borno
State and the headquarters of Boko Haram until it was forced out by the military and
vigilante groups.