Curfew imposed on Numan after religious clashes

A dusk-to-dawn curfew has been imposed on the town of Numan in Nigeria’s eastern Adamawa State. Police have been given orders to shoot troublemakers on sight after two days of deadly clashes between Christians and Muslims.

State police commissioner, Hafiz Ringim, told reporters that 10 people had died in the violence earlier this week, but residents and other witnesses put the death toll at more than 30.

Fighting broke out on Tuesday over a dispute about the construction of a new mosque next to the house of a Christian tribal chief in the mainly Christian town on the banks of the Benue river. The clashes continued on Wednesday before police reinforcements brought the situation under control.

Adamawa state governor Boni Haruna imposed the curfew on Wednesday and has ordered the security agencies to shoot-on-sight anyone causing more trouble.

“Anybody that is seen attacking, torching a house or any property of others should be shot on sight immediately,” he told police and security officials who accompanied him on the visit to the town on Wednesday.

The fighting in Numan is the latest episode of religious violence in Nigeria’s Middle Belt region, wedged between the predominantly-Islamic north and largely-Christian south.

Last month, the Nigerian Red Cross quoted residents of Yelwa in Plateau State as saying more than 600 Muslims were killed there when militiamen from the mainly Christian Tarok ethnic group launched an attack on the small town.

The Yelwa massacre provoked the reprisal killing of Christians in Kano, the largest ciy in northern Nigeria. President Olusegun Obasanjo subsequently declared a state of emergency in Plateau State to clamp down on the religious violence and prevent it from spreading to other parts of Africa's most populous country.