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Nigeria: More than 1,000 Christians murdered by Islamic militants in 2023

by Karen Faulkner, Worthy News Correspondent

(Worthy News) – The International Christian Concern (ICC) international aid advocacy organization reports that over 1,000 Christians have been murdered by Islamic militant extremists in Nigeria so far this year. The killings were carried out by Fulani herdsmen, and the Boko Haram and Islamic State West Africa terror groups.

In addition to killing Christians, militants also kidnap believers, holding them ransoms that are far beyond the means of the poor rural communities to which those abducted usually belong, ICC said. In just one recent example, Fulani militants abducted seven Christians in Bauchi state on August 21. The kidnappers are now demanding a ransom of $2,600 USD (N2 million), which is a huge sum for the abducted Christians’ families. Kidnappers are known to kill their captives if ransom demands are not me.

While Church leaders and secular rights groups have long reported on the genocidal atrocities being committed against Christians in Nigeria, very little has been done to address the situation. “Christian religious leaders addressed the atrocities in Christian communities as persecution, but the Nigerian government addressed the terrorists as unknown gunmen or bandits,” ICC notes.

Ranking Nigeria 6th on its World Watch List 2023 of the top 50 countries where Christians are persecuted, the US Open Doors international Christian advocacy organization explains in a website statement: “Christians in Nigeria suffer persecution from an ingrained agenda of enforced Islamisation, which is particularly prevalent in the north of the country and has gradually been spreading south.”

“Since the northern states declared allegiance to Sharia (Islamic law) in 1999, this enforced Islamisation has gained momentum, by violent and non-violent means,” Open Doors attests. “Attacks by Islamic militant groups have increased consistently since 2015, but the government has failed to prevent the rise in violence, which affects all Nigerians, but particularly Christians.”