By Joseph DeCaro, Worthy News Correspondent
(Worthy News)-- More than 70 Christian farmers have been murdered last month in Plateau State, Nigeria, after a series of assaults by Muslim Fulani cattle herders.
According to International Christian Concern, herdsmen regularly raid Christian farming communities, often setting homes and churches afire and then shooting anyone trying to escape the flames. But the deadliest of the attacks occurred May 2 when herdsmen set fire to the Church of Christ in Nations in Foron town, killing 27 Christians.
However, Nigerian authorities have refused to acknowledge the sectarian nature of the attacks.
"It is the long-standing issue over grazing rights and cattle rustling between Egba and Fulani people," police spokesman Ezeala Austin said. But witnesses to the assaults heard the herdsmen exclaim "Allahu Akhbar," an exclamation often associated with jihadist terrorism.
"Extremist Muslim Fulani herders are regularly and consciously attacking Christian villages and slaughtering our brothers and sisters in Christ," said ICC Regional Manager of Africa Troy Augustine. "I don't know what else needs to be explained to acknowledge that these people are persecuted because of their faith.
"While the world rightly remembers and prays for Christians in northern Nigeria under threat from Boko Haram, let us not forget those who live under daily suffering at the hands of jihadists also happening in central Nigeria."