Earlier this year, Christian Solidarity International issued a genocide warning for Nigeria, calling on the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council to take action. Other experts and organizations also have been sounding alarms about genocide. A community leader in central Nigeria recently described “the incessant killing” as “more dangerous than coronavirus.”
Yet the escalating violence has received less international attention than did the Boko Haram terror campaign against thousands of children, including Nigerian schoolgirls. Genocide Watch calls Nigeria “a killing field of defenseless Christians,” adding that “Fulani Jihadists have replaced Boko Haram as the deadliest terrorists in the world.”
In its 2020 Annual Report, the USCIRF recommended that the U.S. State Department label Nigeria as a Country of Particular Concern due to “ongoing, systemic, and egregious religious-freedom violations.” It also suggested that the Central African Republic, another country in the Sahel, be placed on its Special Watch List, pointing to minorities being denied the right to vote because of their faith.
Recommendations in the New USCIRF Report
The USCIRF recommends that the U.S. government “invest in analysis that identifies the perpetrators of violence by and against Fulani groups and their motivations, especially in regions where these dynamics overlap with interreligious tensions.”
It also proposes “targeted sanctions against individuals and identifiable armed groups that are found to be systematically targeting civilians based on their religion or belief.” Focusing on those individuals and groups, it adds, will “delink violence from perceived religious or ethnic identity, thereby deescalating interreligious tensions and sectarian violence.”
A final recommendation is for America’s federal leadership to “support regional governments to build their capacity to identify specific violators of religious freedom, distinguish them from broader religious and ethnic groups, and hold them to account.”
Christians Pray for Action & Intervention
Pastor K.B. Yunana of Christ Apostolic Church in Bokkos, Nigeria, recently told a World Magazine reporter that inaction by local officials is adding to people’s frustration: “When [terrorists] come to kill people and no tangible arrest is made and the culprits are not dealt with, it’s disheartening. [People] become very angry and upset.”
After a Christian pastor was among those killed by Fulani herdsmen in north-central Nigeria in July, the president of a local Baptist Conference expressed alarm and emphasized the need for prayer. “We are dismayed that the government is not doing anything to condemn these attacks on Christians, nor give Christians hope that they are working to end these incessant attacks,” said the Rev. Donald Arak. “On our part, we will continue to pray for God’s intervention to bring to an end these attacks on Christians.”
