“Almost nobody knows what’s happening to the Christians of Nigeria—but even fewer care. Here’s why we should. In Nigeria, which is Africa’s most populous country, Christians don’t have time to worry about culture wars. They’re too busy facing a real one instigated by their Muslim neighbors and by a government that has studiously decided to look the other way. The scope of the violence is so vast as to be almost beyond belief, so let me first give you a snapshot of what’s happening on the ground.

Deborah, now 31 and living in a camp for the internally displaced, was captured by the Boko Haram terrorist group and held captive for a year and a half. The Islamists came to her village and slaughtered her husband and family before abducting her and “marrying” her off to a 20-year-old Muslim terrorist, who complained of her argumentativeness while raping and impregnating her. After Deborah was recaptured following an escape, she received 80 lashes as punishment. She told journalist Douglas Murray that she no longer fears death.

“What sort of death would I be running from?” Deborah asks. “I have already died once.”

You could repeat Deborah’s basic story countless times in Nigeria. Operation World estimates that Nigeria, which is an officially secular state with a Muslim president, is 51 percent Christian and 45 percent Muslim. Since 1999, the West African nation of about 158 million people has been convulsed by ongoing attempts at imposing Islamic law in eight northern, mostly Muslim states, as well as in four other states where Christians predominate or where the numbers are fairly even.

Things are particularly bad in the north right now. Unarmed Christian villages there are sitting ducks for Muslim Fulani tribesmen, who have been armed with weaponry provided by elements in the national military. According to The Spectator, it’s religiously motivated genocide, although outside agencies dismiss the violence as tit-for-tat.

“The locals daren’t collect the freshest bodies,” the magazine reports. “Some who tried earlier have already been killed, spotted by the waiting militia and hacked down or shot. The Fulani are watching everything closely from the surrounding mountains. Every week, their progress across the northern states of Plateau and Kaduna continues. Every week, more massacres—another village burned, its church razed, its inhabitants slaughtered, raped or chased away.”

Open Doors USA, as part of its annual World Watch List, says the killings have jumped by a whopping 62 percent in a year. And while Nigeria is No. 12 on the World Watch List of Christian persecution globally, it’s in the top 10 in terms of overall violence.

And yet it’s not all gloom and doom in Nigeria. As Tertullian reminded us, the blood of the martyrs is often the seed of the church. Operation World says the country now boasts a strong prayer movement, dynamic church growth, and a growing missionary movement, with more than 5,000 cross-cultural workers—many of them in Nigeria or in other African nations.

So while much of the world has forgotten about Nigeria’s persecuted Christians, surely those of us in the West cannot. They are our brothers and sisters, and they’re doing great things in the midst of severe trials. Let’s hold them up in powerful, prevailing prayer.

Let’s also speak up to the new administration in Washington, which says it will stand up for persecuted Christians around the world. Let’s remind them of their promises and make sure they follow through.

The Christians of Nigeria need us, and since we are members of the same worldwide Body of Christ, we need them.”

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Boko Haram Recruited 2,000 Child Soldiers in 2016

“The Nigerian insurgent group Boko Haram recruited 2,000 children to fight in 2016, a United Nations report released on Tuesday said.

The data were part of a report indicating that at least 65,000 children worldwide were released from military and armed groups in the past 10 years, UPI reported.

An estimated 17,000 children were recruited in South Sudan since 2013 and child soldiers in the Central African Republic numbered 10,000, the report by UNICEF said. 

Of those released from military servitude, more than 20,000 were in the Democratic Republic of Congo, nearly 9,000 in the Central African Republic and 1,600 in Chad.

In northeastern Nigeria, more than 100,000 people have been killed in a seven-year conflict with Boko Haram and more than 2 million people have been displaced, Borno state governor, Kashim Shettima, said on February 13. 

Many of the Boko Haram combatants have been boys and girls under the age of 18, and thousands more are among the displaced.

Boko Haram also uses children as suicide bombers. An explosion at a Maiduguri market in December killed at least one person. A local civilian militia leader, Abdulkarim Jabo, commented that the two bombers were girls who appeared to be about 7 or 8 years old.”

https://financialtribune.com/articles/international/60155/boko-haram-recruited-2000-child-soldiers-in-2016

Let’s pray for the end of the terrorist group, Boko Haram, and the release of the children they have captured and are using for fighting and suicide bombings. This is an outrageously wicked group that needs to go out of existence. Let’s pray with His authority and persistence for their overthrow and dissolution

A Nigerian air force jet has mistakenly bombed a camp for displaced people near Rann in the north-east of the country where the military is engaged in what it calls its final push against Boko Haram. Up to 100 people were killed and dozens more injured. The dead include six Red Cross employees. The Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) aid agency said it is treating 120 injured people and is seeking help with medical evacuations. ‘This large-scale attack on vulnerable people who have already fled from extreme violence is shocking and unacceptable’, said the MSF director of operations. A Red Cross spokesman stated that the agency's dead employees had been ‘part of a team that had brought in desperately-needed food for over 25,000 displaced persons’. A spokesman for the Nigerian military said that some ‘remnants’ of Boko Haram had been detected outside Rann, and the military had acted to eliminate them. He said that after the mistake was realised, they were ‘all in pain’.

On Wednesday the Nigerian army said it had arrested 963 persons suspected to be Boko Haram terrorists during an operation between 4 and 9 January. Commander Lucky Irabor said, ‘On 3 January four women and thirteen children were apprehended by vigilantes and were later handed over to our troops. Preliminary investigation revealed that the women were wives of Boko Haram terrorists who fled from Sambisa forest as a result of our operations. All suspects are now in our custody undergoing investigation. On 5 January, following a tip-off, troops arrested four Boko Haram suspects at Shuwari village. Also on 5 January, 119 Nigerian Internal Displacement Persons (IDPs) were handed over to Nigerian troops at Banki by the Cameroonian forces. On 9 January, a surrendered Boko Haram member was identified as a male sympathiser and spy in Monguno area.’

A day of mourning has been declared for the victims of killings in Kaduna, which is to be observed on Sunday, 8 January, 2017. This is following a massacre that occurred on the evening on Monday, 26 December, 2016, in the Sanga Local Government Area of the state. The Secretary General of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), Musa Asake, made the call for a special prayer for the victims, reported to be 38 in number. ‘In view of the present predicament, the president of CAN has directed that Sunday, 8 January, be declared a national day of mourning by all Christians. We are to pray fervently for our southern Kaduna brothers and sisters who are victims of these wanton killings and also for the peace of our dear country, Nigeria.’ Asake thinks the presidency is not doing anything substantial in response to the mass killing of innocent people. ‘While we commend President Muhammadu Buhari for waging war against the Boko Haram fundamentalists since his assumption of office, his silence in the ongoing genocide in the last few weeks speaks volumes over the perceived official endorsement of the dastardly and ungodly acts. The security operatives in the area appear to be turning blind eyes to the killings.’