Blasts heard as Nigerian army battles Islamists in Kano

By Bala Adamu

KANO, Nigeria (Reuters) - Gunshots and explosions rang out on Wednesday in Nigeria's biggest northern city Kano, as the military exchanged fire with suspected militants from the Boko Haram Islamist sect.

Clashes between Boko Haram gunmen and security forces have flared up several times in Kano since the sect killed 186 people in Nigeria's second largest city last month, its deadliest attack so far.

"There was a shootout and four arrests were made while the early morning operation lasted," local spokesman for the Joint Military Taskforce (JTF) Ikedi Iweha Ikidichi said, declining to take further questions.

Boko Haram, which is waging an insurgency to try to impose sharia law across Africa's most populous nation split evenly between Muslims and Christians, has become increasingly sophisticated and deadly in its methods in the last six months.

It often sets off multiple bombs in succession or follows them up with shooting sprees.

It claimed responsibility on Tuesday for attacks in its home base in the northeast town of Maiduguri this week which killed at least 8 people.

"We were stopped from coming out for our early morning prayers, we couldn't leave the house. About 5 a.m. (0400 GMT) the gunshots and explosions started," Stephen Ahmed, a Kano resident, told Reuters by phone.

A spokesman for the National Emergency Management Agency said there were as yet no recorded casualties from the fighting, noting that it mostly happened in the early hours, when a curfew was still in force in Kano.