Nigeria Militants Kill 11 Christians Over Christmas

By Stefan J. Bos, Special Correspondent Worthy News

(Worthy News) – Christians in northeast Nigeria plunged into mourning after Islamist militants killed at least 11 people on Christmas Eve, church sources and officials said.

Fighters of terror group Boko Karam Haram emerged from the Sambisa forest enclave in trucks and motorcycles. They began shooting indiscriminately in the mainly Christian village of Pemi in the northeastern state of Borno, witnesses said.

The attackers also burnt a church, abducted a priest, and stole medical supplies from a hospital, before setting it on fire, according to Vatican sources and residents.

Also, the “terrorists killed seven people, burnt 10 homes and looted food supplies meant to be distributed to residents to celebrate Christmas,” local militia leader Abwaku Kabu added. The death toll later rose to 11 people, but several people tension unaccounted for as villagers fled into the bush during the attack, Worthy News learned.

Pemi is near Chibok where 200 Christian schoolgirls were kidnapped in 2014 and held for years. Boko Haram carried out several attacks in northern Nigeria as it fights to overthrow the government and create an Islamic state.

The group promotes a version of Islam that forbids Muslims and Christians from taking part in activities not derived from Islamic tradition. Boko Haram loosely translates as “western education is forbidden”.

MORE VIOLENCE

In a separate assault on Thursday, gunmen attacked another Christian community in Garkida, in neighboring Adamawa state, reports said. The gunmen were looting drug stores and food supplies before torching homes, residents told reporters.

There were no immediate reports of casualties from that attack. Security agencies had in recent days warned of an increased risk of attack during the Christian holiday, following a pattern on previous occasions. Last year, Boko Haram released a video purportedly showing the murder of 11 Christians in Nigeria’s Borno State on Christmas Day.

More recently on November 28, Boko Haram killed about 110 farmers in Koshebe, Borno. On December 11 more than 330 students were abducted from a government-run boarding school in the northwestern state of Katsina, an attack claimed by Boko Haram.

Many of them were rescued a week later after a gun battle with the abductors. In several parts of Nigeria, communities have resorted to self-defense and formed armed vigilantes or militias, who work alongside the army. Violence has spread to neighboring Niger, Chad, and Cameroon, prompting regional countries to form a military coalition to fight jihadist groups.

In a statement, Nigerian PresidentMuhammadu Buhari “reiterated the promise” of his administration “to remain unyielding in confronting the Boko Haram insurgency as well as other forms of criminality.” Buhari added: “For me, providing security for all residents in the country remains an article of faith.”

The decade-long conflict in Nigeria’s northeast has killed 36,000 people and displaced some two million from their homes, according to the United Nations.

Latest Worthy News