Over a dozen die in new clashes in Plateau State

A fresh outbreak of religious violence in parts of central Nigeria’s Plateau State has resulted in more than 12 deaths, forcing the state's authorities to impose night-time curfews in the affected areas, officials said on Monday.

The latest round of violence in the increasingly volatile state started on Thursday in the town of Yelwa, before spreading to Langtang, Wase and Shendam districts. It was sparked by a dispute that arose after Christian youths attempted to prevent a love affair between a Christian girl and a Muslim man.

"Preliminary reports show that the fighting (in Yelwa) resulted in the death of about six people," Ezekiel Gomos, secretary to the state government, said in a statement on Friday.

Local government sources said further fighting on Friday and Saturday claimed more lives. "At least six more people were reported dead in Wase and Shendam, with as yet an unknown number of casualties in Langtan," Michael Tuhumang, a local government official from Shendam, told IRIN.

Army troops and anti-riot police have been sent to the affected areas to keep the peace and enforce the curfew, officials said.

There have been intermittent clashes in Plateau State between local people, who are mostly Christians, and mainly Muslim settlers from farther north since September 2001, when ethno-religious violence broke out in Jos, the state capital. At least 1,000 people had been killed in a week of fighting between local Christians and Hausa-Fulani Muslims in the Jos disturbances.

Tension had been building up since 2000, when states in northern Nigeria began to adopt the Sharia - Islamic law - which prescribes death by stoning for adultery, amputation of limbs for stealing and public flogging for drinking alcohol. Thus far 12 states have adopted the Sharia.

In May more than 10 people died in ethno-religious violence which tore through Plateau State's Bassa, Riyom and Bukuru local government areas.