A Christian victim of a Fulani attack in Plateau State. csi
Since U.S. President Donald Trump posted about “the killing of Christians” on November 1, global media attention has turned toward Nigeria. Religious freedom advocates know the country as the deadliest place in the world to be a Christian. Critics argue the violence has nothing to do with religion at all. This dismissal of a key driver in the conflict hampers meaningful progress toward ending the frequent massacres and abductions that plague Nigeria.
The week after Trump’s statements, the U.S. Department of State designated Nigeria a Country of Particular Concern (CPC). Nigeria had previously been added to the list in 2020, but was removed under President Biden’s administration. The label indicates “particularly severe violations of religious freedom” in the country.
In response, many media outlets have published articles arguing that the violence in Nigeria is not, in fact, driven by religion. These articles point out that the same groups that kill Christians in Nigeria also frequently kill Muslims, and that a state of general insecurity prevails in much of the country. Many of the massacres are simply part of a farmer-herder conflict over resources, not a religious one.
Many Nigerian Muslims have indeed become victims to the violence perpetrated by jihadist groups like Boko Haram and by Fulani militias, as these articles suggest. But the fact that Muslims suffer from the same jihadist violence that is destroying Christian villages does not negate the added threat Christians face on account of their faith.
CSI issued a Genocide Warning for Christians in Nigeria in 2020. Our position is that, while Nigerians of all religions suffer from insecurity, only Christians and other non-Muslims are systematically targeted for violence on the basis of their religious identity by groups like Boko Haram, the Islamic State West Africa Province, Ansaru, and the Fulani militia groups active in Nigeria’s Middle Belt.
This distinction is more than a technicality. In frontline states like Kaduna, Christians are roughly 8.7 times more likely to be killed than Muslims.
By recategorizing the deadly attacks as a conflict primarily over resources rather than religion, a key driver at the root of the issue is ignored and efforts to end the suffering risk being waylaid.
Seven indicators pointing to the targeting of Christians:
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Anti-Christian ideology shared by attackers
Boko Haram explicitly declared a “holy war” against Christians in 2010. Local Fulani militant groups in the Middle Belt, though lacking a unified organization or leader, share the same Muslim supremacist worldview and use tactics similar to Boko Haram in their attacks. Islamist Fulani groups seek to conquer the Middle Belt by displacing the Christians, whom they consider “kuffar,” or unbelievers. These groups draw inspiration from Osman Dan Fodio, a Fulani religious leader who founded the Sokoto caliphate in 1804 and tried and failed to conquer the Middle Belt.
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A program of demographic change
Nigeria’s Middle Belt, a large, fertile region spanning the center of the country, is home to hundreds of indigenous groups, most of which practice Christianity. Since the mid-2010s, Fulani militias have systematically attacked villages belonging to these groups. These attacks have displaced hundreds of thousands of Christians, and Fulani settlers have occupied hundreds of Christian villages, often officially renaming them with Islamic or Fulani names. The clear aim of these attacks is to alter the demography of the Middle Belt by emptying it of its Christian population.
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Key targets: Churches, church leaders, and Christian schools
Clergy are often killed in their own homes. In the northeast, Christian leaders are frequently targeted in abductions, as are their families. Churches are attacked during worship services. In November, over 300 children were abducted from a Catholic school. This was the largest single abduction since the kidnapping of 276 mostly Christian schoolgirls from Chibok in 2014, many of whom are still missing.
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Frequent attacks on Christian holidays
Across several years, a clear pattern has emerged: Major Fulani militia attacks often occur on Christian holidays. As Christmas approaches, Christians in Nigeria are bracing for increased violence.
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Asymmetry of resources and weapons
Fulani attackers often arrive with motorbikes and AK-47 rifles – weapons not present in Christian communities in the Middle Belt, who lack even the resources needed to access these. What arms they do have are frequently confiscated by Nigerian security forces. The violence is not an evenly matched conflict; it is a recurring slaughter.
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Impunity of perpetrators
Despite widespread mass killings in the Middle Belt, and the presence of a military “peacekeeping” mission in the region, the Nigerian security forces rarely intervene to stop attacks. As recently as December 12, a Fulani militia group carried out a sustained attack on a Christian village in Plateau state, killing four children – just a kilometer away from a military checkpoint. It is widely believed that Fulani militia groups operate with the complicity, if not outright support, of elements within Nigeria’s Fulani Muslim-dominated security state.
Families of those abducted who turn to the police or courts often receive no help and face punishment instead. Islamist violence has increased since the 2023 elections solidified Muslim dominance in the government, with Muslim President Bola Tinubu breaking an unwritten rule by choosing a coreligionist as vice president, rather than following the norm of selecting a Christian counterpart to maintain a representative religious balance.
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Institutionalized discrimination against Christians
Islamic shari’a civil and penal law has been imposed in twelve states in northern Nigeria – including states with substantial Christian populations or even majorities, such as Plateau and Kaduna. Christians in these states often face discrimination or violence from the official religious police, and find it impossible to buy land for churches or conduct normal business.
A growing number of individuals in these states – Muslims, Christians, and freethinkers – have been arrested on charges of “blasphemy” against Islam. The message to all is that Islam is the religion of the state, and Christians are, at best, tolerated outsiders. This official discrimination can foster mob violence against Christians, as in the case of Deborah Yakubu, who was publicly lynched in Sokoto in 2022 after being accused of blasphemy. To date, none of her murderers have faced justice.
