At least 17 children have died after a fire broke out at an Islamic school in northwest Nigeria, the country’s emergency management agency said.

About 100 children were at the school when the fire broke out on Wednesday evening in the Kaura Namuda area of Zamfara state, the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) said in a statement.

Seventeen children were seriously injured and are being treated in various hospitals, NEMA said.
It was not immediately clear what caused the fire, and authorities launched an investigation into the incident on Thursday.