by Ahmed Saka%u2028
JOS, Nigeria (AP) — Soldiers in a central Nigerian
city opened fire Saturday on university students protesting continuing violence
between Christians and Muslims, witnesses said, with at least nine people
killed in the ensuing violence.
The shooting came as gas stations and farmers'
markets smoldered after late Friday violence that sparked when Christian
students attacked Muslims trying to bury a corpse in Jos, a city at the epicenter
of tensions between Nigeria's two dominant faiths. One Muslim died in that
attack, which sparked retaliatory assaults on Christian churches in the region
Saturday morning.
This is the latest violence in Jos and its
surrounding villages, a region once known as a vacation spot for British
colonialists and as a tin mining town. Human Rights Watch said at least 1,000
people died in 2010 and another 200 more have died within the last month in
violence largely fueled by ethnic, economic and political disputes.
Saturday morning, witnesses said students marched
toward soldiers, upset over the deaths of the fellow classmates. A student
leader told The Associated Press that two students had died — one stabbed by a
rioter, another shot dead.
Brig. Gen. Hassan Umaru told journalists that
soldiers opened fire because the students had refused to return to the
University of Jos campus. Umaru said he had no information about any deaths in
the shooting.
Later on Saturday, Muslim rioters tore down a
Baptist church and another Christian church was set ablaze, said Mark Lipdo,
who runs a nonprofit Christian organization in the city. Lipdo said three
others had been killed in the violence, including a 7-year-old child.
Lawyer Ahmed Garba, who represents an Islamic group
in the region, said four bodies had been brought to the city's central mosque.
Garba said mosque officials continued to look for wounded and dead people in
the streets.
As many as 13 people died overnight Thursday after
gunmen attacked four Christian villages near Jos. The city has been on edge
since a series of bombs exploded there Christmas Eve, killing dozens.
Nigeria, an oil-rich country of 150 million people,
is almost evenly split between Muslims in the north and the predominantly
Christian south. Jos is in the nation's "middle belt," where dozens
of ethnic groups vie for control of fertile lands.
Recent violence in central and northern Nigeria
comes as President Goodluck Jonathan, a Christian who took power after the
death of Nigeria's elected Muslim leader, seeks the presidency. Some believe a
northern candidate should stand in Jonathan's place to appease an unwritten
power-sharing agreement in the oil-rich nation's ruling party.
Copyright 2011 The Associated Press.
