The bombings targeted a phone market in the northern town of Kano in the late afternoon.

Police put the death toll at least 17, including the two suicide bombers, but witnesses said as many as 25 people could have been killed.

Nobody took immediate responsibility for the attack, although it resembles previous attacks by Boko Haram.

The deadly terror group has used female suicide bombers as young as seven in the past.

Police said the girls in Wednesday's suicide bombing could have been as young as 11 and 18-years-old.

The twin suicide bombing comes only a day after another attack in the northeastern town of Yola killed at least 32 people.

Since coming to power on May 29, President Muhammadu Buhari has vowed to crush Boko Haram, one of the world's deadliest and most brutal terror organizations on par with the "Islamic State."

On Wednesday, Buhari had his predecessor's national security advisor arrested on charges of siphoning off several billion dollars from bogus military contracts meant to fight Boko Haram.

Nearly 20,000 people have been killed in six-years of conflict with Boko Haram, which has spread across several West African countries.

cw/jil (AFP, dpa, Reuters)