Nigeria: Dozens killed in Christian-Muslim strife
People walk near ashes after the burning of the Dullahi gas station burnt by angry Christian youths in reaction to a bomb attack at the Shalom Church in Kaduna on June 17, 2012. / Getty Images
(AP) KADUNA, Nigeria - Aid workers searched for bodies Monday among charred vehicles and destroyed market stalls after a trio of church bombings sparked reprisal killings in northern Nigeria, officials said. The Nigerian Red Cross said the death toll had more than doubled, to 50 people.
A radical Islamist sect on Monday claimed responsibility for Sunday's suicide attacks at two churches in the city of Zaria and another in the city of Kaduna that left 21 people dead, according to an initial count.
The reprisals highlight festering religious tensions in Nigeria, a nation of more than 160 million people. The attacks occurred in the religious flashpoint state of Kaduna that sits at the border between the country's predominantly Muslim north and its mainly Christian south. A history of attacks and counterattacks between the two communities means that authorities are often cautious about releasing death figures.
Officials initially said 21 people were killed in Sunday morning's blasts. But the Nigerian Red Cross said late Sunday that the death toll had jumped to 50, to include reprisal killings. Officials refused to give a breakdown clarifying who died in the initial blasts and who was killed in reprisals.
"We did that for a reason," said Andronicus Adeyemo, deputy head of disaster management at the Nigerian Red Cross. "Those figures are sensitive."
Amid the aftermath of those attacks, police say men armed with bombs and guns have launched attacks in a city in a separate part of northeast Nigeria where a radical Islamist sect had killed scores of people last year.
It was not immediately clear what parts of Damaturu were attacked beginning at about 5 p.m. Monday, or whether there were any casualties, said Yobe state police chief Patrick Egbuniwe. It was also not clear who was attacking whom.
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But Egbuniwe said "terrorists are trying to show that they can't be stopped." But he also said the violence appeared to be calming down.
In November, the radical Islamist sect known as Boko Haram claimed responsibility for bombings and shootings in Damaturu, including some at Christian churches, which left more than 100 people dead in and around the city.
Authorities fear that a breakdown of the deaths from Sunday's attacks will trigger revenge killings. Most of the victims killed in church on Sunday are presumed to be Christian and most of those killed in reprisal attacks are presumed to be Muslim, raising concerns that a distinction between initial and reprisal deaths will be interpreted as a Christian and Muslim breakdown.
In Kaduna, relief officials said they were still collecting bodies on Monday. Most victims were petty traders and transporters such as bus drivers and motorcycle taxi drivers, who are presumed to be Muslim and who commute daily to the predominantly Christian southern part of the city. An Associated Press reporter saw charred motorcycles, buses and stalls that littered deserted streets in predominantly Christian neighborhoods Monday. The state government initially imposed a 24-hour curfew, but relaxed it Monday to a dusk-until-dawn curfew.
"We are still picking up bodies from reprisals," Musa Illalah, the National Emergency Management Agency coordinator for Kaduna State, said Monday morning.
The group known as Boko Haram said in an email that it was responsible for the attacks.
"Allah has given us victory in the attacks we launched (Sunday) against churches in Kaduna and Zaria towns which resulted in the deaths of many Christians and security personnel," the statement said in the local Hausa language.
Boko Haram, whose name means "Western education is sacrilege" in Hausa, is waging an increasingly bloody fight with Nigeria's security agencies and public. More than 580 people have been killed in violence blamed on the sect this year alone, according to an AP count.
As news of the church attack filtered through the city Sunday morning, young Christians took to the streets in violent protest. An AP reporter saw billows of smoke over a mosque in a predominantly Christian part of the city. People had mounted illegal roadblocks and were seen harassing motorists. A motorcycle rider in that same neighborhood lay seriously hurt and bleeding by the road side. Motorbike riders often become easy targets during reprisal attacks by Christians. Police said that about 1,000 Muslims took refuge at police quarters.
The first two suicide bomb attacks occurred Sunday within about 10 minutes of each other in different part of the city of Zaria. Thirty minutes later, a third attack targeting a church rocked the nearby city of Kaduna. All three attacks wounded at least 100 people, an official who works with a relief agency involved in rescue efforts had said Sunday. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak to journalists.
Churches have been increasingly targeted by violence in Nigeria. This is the third weekend in a row that Boko Haram is claiming responsibility for church attacks in central and northern Nigeria. Statements attributed to the group said they were responsible for church attacks in the first and second Sundays of June that killed at least 21 people.
That threat has prompted churches to boost their security.
Police said security guards stationed outside the three churches had kept the number of deaths relatively low.
"In most of the attacks, they (the attackers) did not reach their desired location," national police spokesman Frank Mba told Nigeria's state-run television.
The most deadly attacks seem to have targeted Christian holidays: An Easter Day blast in Kaduna left at least 38 people dead, and a Christmas Day suicide bombing of a Catholic church near Nigeria's capital killed at least 44. Boko Haram claimed responsibility for both attacks.
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Man's Search For Spirituality by E Christopher Reyes.
A chronological presentation of the various beliefs of mankind and how it has affected the history of the world.
You are making assuptions that are not so.
All religions are evil, whether it be the Christians doing exactly what the Muslims and others have done so many times in the past in the name of their Mythical God,no doubt you know of the inquisitions, the Heresy trials etc, the people, though later proven correct who were murdered or excummunicated from the Christian church because they dared point out that the so called teachings of God? were incorrect, e.g Joseph Bacon, Gallileo. also the totally evil Popes, e.g The Borgia's, the Medicii's Eugenio Pacelli and just so many more
Is it not evil to use lies and fabrications to instil fear in the gullible, in order to control them for what really are political reasons.
I am sure if you open your eyes, you will see the average non believer considers Islam as the most evil of all in this modern day, having, taken over from Christianity and it's evil excesses of the past.
If you are so sure of the existance of this God, then please provide some evidence of that existance, but please do not use meaningless hypothesis.
I have asked this question of many on this board in the past, and am still awaiting an answer, all, so far either use meaningless hypothesis or realise they can not supply even the tiniest fragment of evidence, and hide by not replying.
I look forward with anticipation to your reply.
For a good reference on the saving grace of God, see if you can find a local Teen Challenge chapter and personally seek a testimony of someone saved from the ravages of drug use. There are thousands of young Americans who have fallen to the drug culture only to be saved through the healing power of Jesus.
Deaths attributed to Christianity:
- Salem witch trials, America, 1692-1693: 35 dead, 150
incarcerated;
-Joan of Arc, Europe, 1431: burned for witchcraft
-1484-1782 Christian church executed 300,000 for witchcraft
(World Book Encyclopedia and Encyclopedia Americana)
-1017 & 14th century Inquisitions: Approximately 3,000 people
killed
-Crusades (there were actually 7 different crusades that were an
attempt to free the Holy Lands from Muslim usurpation) tens of
thousands died. Sources: World Book Encyclopedia and
Encyclopedia Americana . You can also read in Newsweek,
August 31, 1992
Deaths attributed non-religious ideals:
-1949-1965, Mao Tse Tung killed 32 to 63.7 million Chinese
(according to Figaro magazine, 11/5/78)
-10/1917-12/1959, Lenin, Stalin, & Khruschev killed 66.7 million
(estimated by Alexander Solzhenitsyn, USSR Nobel Peace Prize
Winner)
-1975-1975, Cambodian Holocost: One third of the entire country
was put to death under the rule of Pol Pot, the founder of the
Communist Party of Kampuchea. Deaths in the Tuol Sleng
interrogation center in Phnom Penh, which is the capitol of
Kampuchea, reached 582 in a day (according to the Khmer Rouge
foreign minister.
-1210-1219 & 1311-1340: Mongolian invasion of northern China,
estimated 35 million dead.
-1643-1647, bandit leader Chang Hsien-Chung (Yellow Tiger) killed
approximately 40 million in the Szechwan province.
None of these involve religion. And all but the very last actually assert atheism. Source: The Guinness Book of World Records . Category "Judicial"; Subject "Crimes: Mass Killings,"
Seems to me, many more have been killed in the name of Atheism than any religion, especially Christianity. Based upon this information, it seems to me that the real ones trying to control others and those we should be scared of are those who do not subscribe to any religion at all.
Regarding proof of God, I don't need to provide you with any proof. You are the one advancing the argument there is no God. Therefore, it is up to you to provide evidence that this is no God. You see, it's a double-edged sword. If you're stating there is no God, it's up to you to provide the evidence to support your position. It would be like "proving" and showing concrete "evidence" that you have an entity such as a conscience. I want to see hard, concrete, tangible, measurable evidence that the human conscience, specifically yours, exists.
I will await your reply, but I'm quite certain that you cannot supply even the tiniest fragment of evidence, to disprove your claim that God does not exist or that even a human conscience exists and will, therefore, hide by not replying.
And if you are only "about the New Testament", then be sure to get rid of your Creation Story and the Ten Commandments.
Deuteronomy is a HOOT!
--"In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted" 2 Tim. 3:12
--John 15:20 Remember the words I spoke to you: 'No servant is greater than his master.' If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also. If they obeyed my teaching, they will obey yours also.
--Acts 14:22 strengthening the disciples and encouraging them to remain true to the faith. "We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God," they said.
--Corinthians 15:19 If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men.
--2 Corinthians 4:9 persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.