United States Commission on International Religious Freedom, USCIRF, has expressed concern over ongoing attacks and retaliations by Muslims and Christians in Nigeria’s Plateau State, which have left more than 100 persons dead and dozens of property destroyed since March this year.
According to commission’s chair, Dr. Katrina Swett, “The recent Muslim-Christian violence in Plateau State exposes the Nigerian government’s failure to effectively deal with a history of religiously-related violence that threatens the country’s stability.
“Religiously-related violence has led to more deaths in Northern Nigeria than have Boko Haram attacks. The Nigerian government needs to end this entrenched violence and the culture of impunity.”
USCIRF had recommended, since 2009, that Nigeria be named a “country of particular concern” (CPC) due to the government’s failure to hold accountable, perpetrators of religiously-related violence. The statement added that, “while since 1999, more than 14,000 persons, both Muslims and Christians, have been killed, USCIRF has been able to document that only one per cent of the perpetrators have been prosecuted.”
