A massacre in a village in northeastern Nigeria left at least 110 dead, the United Nations humanitarian coordinator in the country says.
The Jihadist group Boko Haram is believed to be responsible for the killings, TRT World reported.
UN Nigeria humanitarian coordinator Edward Kallon said armed men on motorcycles led the gruesome attack on men and women who were harvesting their crops. They were all "ruthlessly killed" with several women kidnapped, Kallon said.
The killings this past weekend occurred in a field in Garin Kwashebe, a rice-farming community, on the day the locals were casting votes for the first time in 13 years to elect their councilmen, though most of them did not vote.
Based on reports, the farmers, many of them men, were rounded up and sprayed with bullets by the assailants. In the village of Koshobe, some of the victims were tied up and had their throats slit, an anti-Boko Haram militia told the AFP.
Kallon said it was the "most violent direct attack against innocent civilians this year," as he calls on the government to bring the perpetrators of the heinous crime to justice. He also called for the immediate release of the missing women.
No one has claimed responsibility for the massacre, but Boko Haram and its splinter group - the Islamic State in West Africa Province (ISWAP) - have launched a wave of brutal killings in the area in recent years.
The polls had been postponed on many occasions because of a rise in the number of killings by Boko Haram and a rival dissident faction, ISWAP.
Both militant organizations have killed over 30,000 people in the past 10 years during an armed campaign that has displaced some 2 million civilians. The senseless acts have spread to neighboring nations, including Cameroon, Chad, and Niger.
Muhammadu Buhari, President of Nigeria, expressed grief over the murders. "I condemn the killing of our hardworking farmers by the terrorists... my thoughts are with their families in this time of grief. May their souls rest in peace," Taipei Times reported.
