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Catholic World News News Feature

Christian militia massacres Muslims in Nigeria town May 05, 2004

About 300 Muslims were killed last Sunday by a Christian militia in Nigeria's central Plateau state, according to Muslim leaders and local authorities. The killings are part of escalating interreligious violence that has taken the lives of at 700 people over the last three months.

The Christian Tarok tribe and Muslim Fulani tribe have historically clashed over rich farmland in the region, and ethnic and religious divisions in the African country have fuelled the fighting. Justice Abdulkadir Orire, secretary general of the Jama'atu Nasril Islam, blamed the state governor for the latest massacre in the town of Yelwa, claiming the local police were pulled out four days before the attack. "It seems the governor is supporting the move. We heard that the government said non-indigenes should move out of the area," Orire said. "That is very bad. He should look after everyone in the state and not just his own tribe."

Orire called the attack "genocide" because women and children were killed. On Tuesday, thousands of Muslims lined the streets of Yelwa chanting and vowing revenge. President Olusegun Obasanjo ordered the police to send hundreds of riot police to the area.

Yelwa was also the sight of another massacre in February, when 48 Christians were killed by Fulani militia in a church that they then burned. The region has been torn apart periodically by religious violence in recent years. More than 1,000 people died in the state capital of Jos in 2001 in ethnic violence. More than 11,000 people have died in ethnic, religious, and political violence in Nigeria since Obasanjo was elected in 1999, ending 15 years of military rule.