KANO: Armed gangs kidnapped at least 163 Christian worshippers after storming two churches in Nigeria&#39;s northern Kaduna State on Sunday, a member of the clergy told AFP. Gangs &mdash; known in Nigeria as &quot;bandits&quot; &mdash; frequently <a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/nigerian-gunmen-free-kidnapped-muslim-religious-travellers" style="color:#0073e6;">carry out</a>&nbsp;mass kidnappings for <a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/abductors-free-12-young-girls-kidnapped-in-nigeria" style="color:#0073e6;">ransom</a> and loot villages, mainly in the northern and central parts of Africa&#39;s most populous country. Sunday&#39;s attacks are the latest in a <a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/100-kidnapped-nigerian-schoolchildren-released-report" style="color:#0073e6;">wave of kidnappings</a> targeting both Christians and Muslims in Nigeria. &quot;The attackers came in numbers and blocked the entrance of the churches and forced the worshippers out into the bush,&quot; Reverend Joseph Hayab, head of the Christian Association of Nigeria for the country&#39;s north, said on Monday. &quot;The actual number they took was 172, but nine escaped, so 163 are with them,&quot; added Hayab. Ishaku Dan&#39;azumi, a traditional chief of Kurmin Wali, said 166 people were seized from three churches in the village during Sunday service. A security report prepared for the United Nations said &quot;armed bandits&quot; attacked multiple churches in the area on Sunday, abducting &quot;over 100 worshippers.&quot; Kaduna state police did not confirm the attack. But its chief told reporters after in Kaduna city that officers responded and went to the &quot;alleged scene of crime&quot; on Sunday. &quot;Till now there is no information about any attack or any kidnapping,&quot; police commissioner Muhammad Rabiu said in remarks broadcast on a local tv channel. State commissioner for internal security Sule Shauibu dismissed the &quot;narrative&quot; about the kidnapping as &quot;totally false, we do not have any evidence of such.&quot; Local chief Wali told AFP that &quot;it is only politicians that are denying the kidnapping of our people.&quot; &quot;They took away 177 people from three churches but 11 managed to escape. We now have 166 people in the hands of the kidnappers,&quot; he said. He said his village has lived under threat from gunmen &quot;who kidnap our people. This has affected our farming activities as we grow less food than we used to. &quot;We have never complained to the authorities over kidnappings in our area, as we have been the ones contributing to pay for the freedom of those kidnapped. Sometimes up to 20 are abducted, and we have never complained; we have been dealing with the problem on our own.&quot; &quot;This time we complained to the authorities because the number of those kidnapped is beyond our capacity to deal with,&quot; he said. Roughly evenly split between a mostly Christian south and Muslim-majority north, Nigeria is home to myriad conflicts, which experts say kill both Christians and Muslims, often without distinction. In November, armed gangs seized more than 300 students and teachers from a Catholic school in Niger state, with 50 escaping and the rest being released in two batches weeks later. US President Donald Trump has latched onto the insecurity in Nigeria, focusing on the killing of Christians and putting Abuja under diplomatic pressure. In late December, the United States launched strikes on what it and the Nigerian government said were militants linked to the Islamic State group in the northwestern Sokoto state. Nigeria said it approved the strikes. More attacks &#39;likely&#39;&nbsp;Kaduna is one of several states in northwest and central Nigeria that have for years been terrorized by criminal gangs who raid villages, abduct residents and burn homes after looting them. Kajuru district is a hotspot for bandit attacks in Kaduna State, which has witnessed clashes between Christian farmers and Fulani Muslim herders. The violence centers around competition for land and dwindling resources, although on the surface it falls along ethnic and religious lines. Nigeria&#39;s kidnappings are predominantly for ransom and the crisis has &quot;consolidated into a structured, profit-seeking industry&quot; that raised some $1.66 million between July 2024 and June 2025, according to a recent report by SBM Intelligence, a Lagos-based consultancy.

Africa

Gangs frequently carry out mass kidnappings for ransom and loot villages, mainly in the northern and central parts of Africa's most populous country; Sunday's attacks are the latest in a wave of kidnappings targeting both Christians and Muslims in Nigeria.

Gunmen kidnap 163 worshippers from two Nigerian churches: clergy

LAGOS: Nigeria&#39;s drug enforcement agency Sunday said it had arrested 22 Indian crew members of a merchant ship after 31.5 kilograms of cocaine was found on the vessel at Lagos&#39;s main port.&nbsp;The seizure was made on January 2 aboard MV Aruna Hulya which &quot;originated from Marshall Islands,&quot; Femi Babafemi, spokesman for the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), said in a statement.&nbsp;Nigeria has long been considered a trafficking and production hub for drugs bound for Europe and other African countries.&nbsp;The agency said in November that it arrested 20 Filipino sailors caught ferrying at least 20 kilograms of cocaine from Brazil to the same port.&nbsp;Earlier that month, NDLEA said it was working with US and British anti-drug agencies to investigate a cartel behind the importation of 1,000 kilograms of cocaine discovered in a container at a Lagos port.

On Sunday, Nigeria’s drug enforcement agency arrested 22 Indian crew members after 31.5 kilograms of cocaine were found on their merchant ship at Lagos’s main port.

Nigeria arrests 22 Indian ship crew members in drug bust

LAGOS:&nbsp;Nigeria on Friday signalled that more strikes against fighter groups were expected after a Christmas Day attack by US forces that President Donald Trump said &quot;decimated&quot; Islamic State-linked camps they targeted in the northwest of the country. Nigeria insisted it was a joint operation, saying that it provided intelligence for Thursday&#39;s attack. The US military said the strikes killed multiple IS fighters. A Pentagon official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told AFP that the strikes &quot;were approved by the government of Nigeria,&quot; without saying whether Nigeria&#39;s military had been involved. Trump said in an interview published Friday that the strikes had been scheduled earlier than Thursday, &quot;And I said, &#39;nope, let&#39;s give a Christmas present.&#39; &quot;They didn&#39;t think that was coming, but we hit them hard. Every camp got decimated,&quot; he told Politico. Nigeria, located in West Africa, faces interlinked security crises, with fighter groups waging an insurgency in the northeast since 2009 and armed gangs raiding villages and staging kidnappings in the northwest. The strikes came after Abuja and Washington had been locked in a diplomatic dispute over what Trump has characterised as the mass killing of Christians amid Nigeria&#39;s myriad armed conflicts. Questions remain over which armed group was targeted, and details over the strikes have varied between Nigerian and US accounts. Washington&#39;s framing of the violence as amounting to Christian &quot;persecution&quot; is rejected by the Nigerian government and independent analysts, but has nonetheless resulted in increased security coordination. US defense officials posted a video of what appeared to be a nighttime missile launch from the deck of a battleship flying the US flag. &quot;It&#39;s Nigeria that provided the intelligence,&quot; the country&#39;s foreign minister, Yusuf Tuggar, told broadcaster Channels TV, saying he had been on the phone with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio ahead of the strikes. Asked if there would be more strikes, Tuggar said: &quot;It is an ongoing thing,&quot; adding, &quot;it must be made clear that it is a joint operation, and it is not targeting any religion.&quot; Targets unclear&nbsp;Nigerian information minister Mohammed Idris said in a statement that the US strikes used 16 guided munitions launched from medium-altitude MQ-9 Reaper drones &quot;successfully neutralising&quot; IS elements attempting to penetrate Nigeria through the Sahel. Both countries said the strikes targeted militants linked to the Islamic State group, without providing details. The Department of Defense&#39;s US Africa Command said &quot;multiple ISIS terrorists&quot; were killed in an attack in the northwestern state of Sokoto. Residents in Sokoto told AFP they were shocked by the blasts, saying some strikes hit a town that was not a militant stronghold. Nigeria&#39;s armed groups are mostly concentrated in the northeast, but have made inroads into the northwest. Researchers have recently linked some members of an armed group known as Lakurawa &mdash; the main group located in Sokoto State &mdash; to Islamic State Sahel Province (ISSP), which is mostly active in neighbouring Niger and Mali. Other analysts have disputed those links. &quot;We initially thought it was (an) attack by Lakurawa,&quot; said Haruna Kallah, a resident of Jabo town. That the explosions were in fact the result of a US strike &quot;surprised us because this area has never been a Lakurawa enclave.&quot; Tukur Shehu, a resident of Tangaza, a neighboring district, said two strikes targeted villages known to house Lakurawa camps from where they launch attacks and keep hostages. Public opinion divided While public opinion on the strikes appeared split, the Nigerian government publicly welcomed them. &quot;I think Trump would not have accepted a &#39;No,&#39;&quot; said Malik Samuel, an Abuja-based researcher for Good Governance Africa, an NGO. Nigerian authorities are keen to be seen as cooperating with the US, Samuel told AFP, even though &quot;both the perpetrators and the victims in the northwest are overwhelmingly Muslim.&quot; Security analyst Brant Philip said the results of the strikes were &quot;not significant, but much is expected soon.&quot;

Details in official communications between Nigeria and the United States have at times differed, possibly due to Washington apparently backing out of issuing a joint statement with Abuja, according to Foreign Minister Yusuf Tuggar.



Nigeria signals more strikes likely in 'joint' US operations

LAGOS: Gunmen ambushed a vehicle in central Nigeria with people travelling for a Muslim religious event and kidnapped 28 people, including women and children, a security report showed Monday. &quot;On the evening of 21 December, gunmen abducted 28 people, including women and children, while they were travelling to a Maulud gathering,&quot; near Zak village in Bashar district in Plateau state, according to a security report prepared for the United Nations and seen by AFP. It is the latest in a string of mass kidnappings in recent weeks, which has put an uncomfortable international spotlight on Nigeria&#39;s grim security situation. Some 130 Nigerian Catholic school pupils were handed over to state authorities on Dec. 22, a day after the government said it had secured their release, a month after one of the country&#39;s worst mass abductions. Kidnappings for ransom are a common way for armed groups to make quick cash in the conflict-hit West African nation of some 230 million.

Gunmen ambush a vehicle in central Nigeria with people travelling for a religious event and kidnapped 28 people, including women and children; it is the latest in a string of mass kidnappings in recent weeks, which has put an uncomfortable international spotlight on Nigeria's grim security situation.


Gunmen kidnap 28 people on a Muslim religious trip in Nigeria: Security report

WASHINGTON:&nbsp;Washington announced Saturday that it has signed a deal to strengthen Nigeria&#39;s health system, a sign of improving ties with Africa&#39;s most populous nation after President Donald Trump denounced attacks against Christians there. Under a five-year bilateral deal, Washington will contribute nearly $2.1 billion to help prevent HIV, tuberculosis, malaria, and polio, and to protect maternal and child health, a US State Department spokesman said. Nigeria has committed to increasing its national health spending by nearly $3 billion over the next five years, the spokesman said, adding that the bilateral deal contains &quot;a strong emphasis on promoting Christian faith-based health care providers.&quot; Last month, Trump stunned many by posting on social media that the United States was ready to take military action in Nigeria to counter the killing of Christians. The US leader has said Christianity faces an &quot;existential threat&quot; in Nigeria and &quot;numerous other countries,&quot; spotlighting what his administration says is global persecution of Christians. Washington has placed Nigeria back on the list of countries of &quot;particular concern&quot; regarding religious freedom and has restricted the issuance of visas to Nigerians. The deal signed Saturday &quot;was negotiated in connection with reforms the Nigerian government has made to prioritize protecting Christian populations from violence,&quot; the State Department spokesman said. Nigeria is divided roughly equally between the predominantly Christian south and the predominantly Muslim north. Abuja maintains that it does not tolerate any religious persecution. It has been battling a jihadist insurgency since 2009, and the conflict has killed at least 40,000 -- both Christians and Muslims -- and displaced around two million, according to the UN. The United States, in early December, signed a $2.5 billion health aid deal with Kenya, the first such bilateral agreement since Trump tore down USAID and sidelined NGOs. Since returning to power, Donald Trump has closed the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the world&#39;s largest aid agency, and ordered an overhaul of American foreign aid under the banner of &quot;America First.&quot;

Americas

The United States signed a five-year $2.1 billion health aid deal with Nigeria, boosting disease prevention and maternal care, emphasizing Christian faith-based providers amid concerns over religious freedom and ties.

US signs health aid deal with Nigeria focusing on Christians

MINNA: Nigerian authorities have secured the release of 100 kidnapped schoolchildren taken by gunmen from a Catholic school last month, a UN source and local media said on Sunday, though the fate of the 165 students and staff thought to remain in captivity remains unclear. In late November, 315 students and staff were kidnapped from St. Mary&#39;s co-educational boarding school in north-central Niger state, as the country buckled under a wave of mass abductions reminiscent of the infamous 2014 Boko Haram abduction of schoolgirls in Chibok. Some 50 escaped shortly afterward, leaving 265 thought to be in captivity The 100 children have arrived in the capital, Abuja, and are set to be handed over to local government officials in Niger state on Monday, according to the United Nations source. &quot;They are going to be handed over to Niger state government tomorrow,&quot; the source told AFP. Local media also reported that the release of 100 children had been secured, without offering details on whether it was done through negotiation or military force, nor on the fate of the remaining students and staff thought to still be in the kidnappers&#39; hands. The freeing of the 100 children was confirmed to AFP by presidential spokesperson Sunday Dare. &quot;We have been praying and waiting for their return, if it is true, then it is a cheering news,&quot; said Daniel Atori, spokesperson for Bishop Bulus Yohanna of the Kontagora diocese, which runs the school. &quot;However, we are not officially aware and have not been duly notified by the federal government.&quot; US diplomatic pressure&nbsp;Though kidnappings for ransom are common in the country as a way for criminals and armed groups to make quick cash, a spate of mass abductions in November put an uncomfortable spotlight on Nigeria&#39;s already grim security situation. The country faces a long-running insurgency in the northeast, while armed &quot;bandit&quot; gangs conduct kidnappings and loot villages in the northwest. In November, assailants across the country kidnapped two dozen Muslim schoolgirls, 38 church worshippers, a bride and her bridesmaids, farmers, women, and children, all taken hostage. It is unclear who was behind the St. Mary&#39;s kidnapping. The kidnappings also came as Nigeria faces a diplomatic offensive from the United States, where President Donald Trump has alleged that mass killings of Christians have amounted to a &quot;genocide&quot; and threatened to intervene militarily. The Nigerian government and independent analysts have rejected that framing, which has long been used by the Christian right in the United States and Europe. The religiously diverse country of 230 million people is the scene of myriad conflicts &mdash; including farmer-herder clashes in the center and separatist violence in the southeast &mdash; that have killed both Christians and Muslims. Kidnapping &#39;industry&#39;&nbsp;One of the first mass kidnappings that drew international attention was in 2014, when nearly 300 girls were snatched from their boarding school in the northeastern town of Chibok by Boko Haram fighters. A decade later, Nigeria&#39;s kidnap-for-ransom crisis has &quot;consolidated into a structured, profit-seeking industry&quot; that raised some $1.66 million between July 2024 and June 2025, according to a recent report by SBM Intelligence, a Lagos-based consultancy. Some analysts have worried that Trump&#39;s recent comments might have emboldened armed groups, while others pointed out that mass kidnappings have come in waves before. A local government official in Nigeria&#39;s eastern Borno state, meanwhile, told AFP armed groups might be trying to hold captives as potential human shields in case the United States follows through on its threat of airstrikes. In recent weeks, security analysts have been tracking US observation flights over known fighters&#39; forest strongholds in northern Nigeria.

The children have arrived in the capital Abuja and are set to be handed over to local government officials in Niger state on Monday.

100 kidnapped Nigerian schoolchildren released: report

LAGOS: A Christian group on Saturday said 315 students and teachers were seized a day earlier in Nigeria&#39;s second mass school abduction in a week, as security fears mounted in Africa&#39;s most populous nation. The early Friday raid on St Mary&#39;s school in Niger state in central Nigeria came after gunmen on Monday stormed a secondary school in neighboring Kebbi state, abducting 25 girls. The Christian Association of Nigeria said the new number came &quot;after a verification exercise&quot; following the early Friday mass kidnapping, and added that &quot;The total number of victims abducted ... is now 303 students and 12 teachers&quot;. The number of students kidnapped is almost half of the school&#39;s 629 enrolled pupils. Authorities in the nearby states of Katsina and Plateau have ordered all schools to close as a precautionary measure. Schools closed&nbsp;The Niger state government closed many schools and President Bola Tinubu cancelled international engagements, including attending the G20 summit in Johannesburg, to handle the crisis. The two abduction operations and an attack on a church in the west of the country, in which two people were killed, have happened since US President Donald Trump threatened military action over what he called the killing of Christians by radical Islamists in Nigeria. Nigeria is still scarred by the kidnapping of nearly 300 girls by Boko Haram jihadists at Chibok in northestern Borno state more than a decade ago.&nbsp; Some of those girls are still missing.

Christian Association of Nigeria said new number came ‘after a verification exercise’ following the early Friday mass kidnapping, and added that ‘The total number of victims abducted ... is now 303 students and 12 teachers’.

Articles tagged with "Nigeria"