Latest News - International

Wed 22 Feb 2006

Violence continues in Nigerian city

Bodies littered the streets of the southern Nigerian city of Onitsha as the death toll from days of Christian-Muslim violence across Nigeria rose to at least 96.

"I've counted more than 20 people killed today," said Onitsha resident Isotonu Achor after gangs of rioters armed with machetes and shotguns poured through the mainly Christian city.

Other witnesses also said they saw at least 20 dead.

Residents said soldiers had opened fire on a mob of ethnic Igbo Christians that tried to enter the military barracks after reports ethnic Hausa Muslims sheltering in the barracks had attacked a nearby primary school, killing a number of children.

The claims could not be verified and it was not clear if the soldiers killed anyone in the mob.

The deaths brought to at least 96 the number of people killed in Nigeria since sectarian violence first erupted on Saturday in the northern city of Maiduguri, where Muslim protests against cartoons caricaturing the Prophet Muhammad turned violent, razing 30 churches and claiming the lives of 18 people, mostly Christians.

Similar violence followed Monday and Tuesday in the northern city of Bauchi, where witnesses and Red Cross officials say 25 people were killed when Muslim mobs attacked Christians there.

Nigeria, Africa's most populous country of more than 130 million people, is roughly divided between a predominantly Muslim north and a mainly Christian south.

Thousands of people have died in religious violence since 2000.

Bauchi was tense but calm, with police and soldiers patrolling the city. In Onitsha, residents and witnesses said two mosques were burned down and least 30 people were killed on Tuesday, most of them northern Muslims.

This article: http://news.scotsman.com/latest_international.cfm?id=277392006

Last updated: 23-Feb-06 07:00 GMT