Latest attack by Muslim sect kills 13 in Nigeria

MAIDUGURI, Nigeria — Violence in two states in northeast Nigeria killed 13 people amid a wave of attacks by a radical Muslim sect, police said.

1. Only on msnbc.com

   1. NBC/Marist poll: Romney leads by 20 points in NH
   2. Chinese try to put lid on Western-style TV
   3. Obama faces constitutional questions over recess appointments
   4. In 'It Takes A Family,' Santorum’s views are an open book
   5. Diver's treasure: 1923 class ring, grateful family
   6. New virus steals your cash — but you won't notice
   7. In Poland, unburying a nation’s Jewish past

Police said Saturday the attacks occurred in Adamawa and Yobe states on Friday night.

In Adamawa, officials said gunmen suspected to belong to a radical sect known as Boko Haram killed eight worshippers at a church. In Yobe, a gun battle between the sect and police killed at least two people.

The attacks come after 20 Christians died during a town hall meeting in rural Adamawa state.

Authorities blamed the attacks on Boko Haram, a radical sect that wants to implement strict Shariah law across Nigeria, a multiethnic nation of more than 160 million people.

"We started hearing many gunshots through the windows," said Okey Raymond, 48, who attended the town hall meeting Friday. "Everyone scampered for safety, but the gunmen chanted: 'God is great God is great' while shooting at us."

Nigeria Christians given three-day terror ultimatum

Raymond said he hid under a table and escaped out a back door. The gunmen also carried knives and machetes, the police commissioner said.

No arrests have been made in the attack, which left at least another 15 people wounded.

Yet another attack on a church in the northeast Nigerian city of Gombe occurred during a prayer service on Thursday night.

Gunmen sprayed the congregation with gunfire and killed at least eight people including the pastor's wife, local medical officials said. No one has claimed responsibility for that attack, though Boko Haram has targeted churches in the past.

At least 510 killings in one year
Boko Haram, whose name means "Western education is sacrilege" in the local Hausa language, is responsible for at least 510 killings last year alone, according to an Associated Press count.

The group claimed responsibility for an attack that killed at least 42 people in a Christmas Day bombing of a Catholic church near Abuja, as well as a suicide car bombing targeting the U.N. headquarters in the capital that killed 25 people and wounded more than 100.

Nigeria's central government has been slow to respond to the sect. On Dec. 31, President Goodluck Jonathan declared regions of Borno, Niger, Plateau and Yobe states to be under a state of emergency — meaning authorities can make arrests without proof and conduct searches without warrants. He also ordered international borders near Borno and Yobe state to be closed.

However, the areas where the recent church and town hall attacks happened are not in the areas marked by the president.

The attack also comes after a spokesman for Boko Haram told The Daily Trust newspaper, northern Nigeria's paper of record, that the group would begin targeting Christians living in Nigeria's Muslim north.

Igbo traders, who belong to one of the country's three dominant ethnic groups, do business and live across Nigeria's north though the Igbo traditionally have lived in the country's southeast. The group has been targeted in the north before. In the months before the country's 1960s civil war, Igbos fled the north after violence against them saw as many as 10,000 people die.

Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source - http://pheedo.msnbc.msn.com/click.phdo?i=7e0638d40d3a14d90cc5efe085e20864