Sunday, March 24, 2013

Nigeria: Muslims destroy 50 of 52 Catholic churches; kill 25 in bus bombing

creeping
via Boko Haram allegedly destroyed 50 Catholic churches in Borno state – UPI.com.
MAIDUGURI, Nigeria, March 18 (UPI) — Boko Haram militants in Nigeria destroyed 50 of Borno state’s Catholic churches, a priest charged.
The Rev. Jerome Ituah of Christ the King Catholic Parish in Kurudu, a populated area of the Abuja Capital Territory, made the accusation Saturday, saying he witnessed the destruction, Leadership Newspapers reported.
“Out of the 52 Catholic churches in Maiduguri diocese, 50 of them have been destroyed by Boko Haram. Yet the faithful are not discouraged of their faith. You would always see them worshiping under rain and sun in open places at the site of their destroyed places of worship,” Ituah said.
Ituah, who was in Maiduguri to lead a retreat with priests and the bishop of the diocese there, called on Catholics in Kurudu to pray for their counterparts in Maiduguri and elsewhere in northern Nigeria.
h/t Jihad Watch who writes:

Shhh. Don’t say anything about this. If you do, it might harm the ongoing “Muslim/Christian dialogue.”
Elsewhere in Nigeria, Muslims kill at least 25 in Kano bus bombing:
A car bomb attack in a Christian enclave of Kano, the largest city in mainly-Muslim Northern Nigeria, has heightened religious and ethnic tensions throughout the country.
At least 25 people have been killed and at least 60 others injured, following the 18th March suicide bomb attack in a bus station in the Christian district of Sabon Gari. The bus station is primarily used by passengers heading for the mostly Christian South of the country. Five buses were destroyed, one reported to be full of people.
The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) and its main Muslim counterpart Jama’atu Nasril Islam, JNI (Society for the Victory of Islam) in separate reactions expressed deep concern. JNI’s President, the Sultan of Sokoto is spiritual leader of Nigeria’s 70 million Muslims and has huge power and influence.
CAN President Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor condemned “the barbaric and sustained bomb and gun attacks on innocent Nigerians” and called on the Federal Government to support the Christian association’s call for the branding of Boko Haram as a Foreign Terrorist Organisation, or FTO.
“The Federal Government should liaise with the international community and obtain their expertise in order to deal with the terror acts.
“The Federal Government cannot continue to condemn these heinous acts of the enemies of unity and agents of death without prosecuting those already arrested. This does not add up in any way. The Federal Government should do the right thing by prosecuting those already in its net with proven record of complicity.
The Christian leader is working for “unity” with a group called “Society for the Victory of Islam”? Talk about a proven record of complicity.

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