Africa, Nigeria

Nigeria: 5,000 killed, 100,000 displaced, and 350 churches in ruins

INDEPENDENT CATHOLIC NEWS
By John Pontifex
May 12, 2015

Families take shelter in a Church in the Diocese of Maiduguri, Nigeria
Families take shelter in a Church in the Diocese of Maiduguri, Nigeria

More than 5,000 Catholics in north-east Nigeria have been killed and at least 100,000 have been displaced, according to a fresh report which highlights the scale of atrocities against Christians in the heartland of Islamist terror group Boko Haram.

The ‘Situation Report on the activities of Boko Haram in the Catholic Diocese of Maiduguri’ states that more than 350 churches in the diocese have been badly attacked, “a good number of them destroyed more than once.”

With more than three-quarters of the diocese under Boko Haram control, the report records that 22 of the diocese’s 40 parish centres and chaplaincies have been deserted and occupied by the terrorists. The report, a copy of which diocesan authorities sent to Aid to the Church in Need, the Catholic charity for persecuted and other suffering Christians, records a total of 7,000 widows and 10,000 orphans.

Commenting on the report, Father Gideon Obasogie, the Diocese of Maiduguri’s director of social communications, said: “People are very scared and those who are able to return home find there is nothing left.” More...