Plateau peace meeting denouces militias

Government officials, political and community leaders met on Sunday to discuss ways to end a year of ethnic and religious turbulence in Nigeria's Plateau State and denounced the emergence of militia groups, saying it is a key factor aggravating conflict. The meeting in the state capital Jos, organised by the governor, Joshua Dariye, was attended by more than 80 participants including human rights groups, traditional and religious leaders and communities that have been affected by ethnic and religious clashes in the past year. "Security agencies should be advised to redouble their efforts at detecting and preventing the outbreak of violence," said the official communique issued at the end of the meeting. "Organisers and perpetrators of conflicts who stock arms and train ethnic and religious militias should be apprehended and prosecuted," it added. The meeting also called for tolerance among the various ethnic communties in the central region state, in order to reduce the sort of friction that has often led to violence. Intermittent communal clashes have rocked Plateau State since September 2001, when ethnic and religious clashes between Muslims and Christians Jos, resulting in the loss of over 1,000 lives. Since the beginning of the year several clashes have occurred in parts of the state, in which mainly local Christians have engaged Muslim Hausa-speakers whose origins are further in the north of the country. Scores of people have died and thousands have been displaced. Relations between Nigeria’s Christians and Muslims have grown increasingly tense since 12 states in the mainly Muslim north introduced strict Islamic or Sharia legal codes. Under this code adultery is punishable by stoning to death, stealing attracts amputation of limbs while drinking of alcohol is punished by public flogging. The pervading tension in the state has been worsened by political violence between rival factions of the ruling People’s Democratic Party.