Crossbench peer Lord Alton has accused the British government of a “terrible lack of realism or understanding” in its response to ongoing violence by Islamist militants in Nigeria.
Nigeria has the largest population in Africa and is more or less equally divided between Christians and Muslims. Open Doors currently ranks it the 7th worst country for anti-Christian persecution in the world, with more Christians killed for their faith every year than all other countries combined.
Deadly attacks happen all year round but sometimes intensify during Christian festivals like Christmas and Easter. Last year one Catholic bishop in Nigeria went so far as to say Christmas attacks by militants were becoming “customary” in parts of the country.
In the latest of many outrages, an ISIS affiliated group killed 29 people in a village in Nigeria's north-eastern Adamawa state.
Writing on X, Lord Alton said the attack was “an affront and a terrible tragedy for bereaved families”, adding “too many of these endless attacks have been ignored and followed by impunity and a lack of accountability or justice".
"You can trace the training and beliefs of IS Jihadists back to the ideology-driven Sudanese regime that succeeded in destroying their own country," he said.
Lord Alton took issue with Britain’s Africa Minister, Baroness Chapman’s answer to a parliamentary question on what support Britain is providing to Nigeria to prevent such attacks.
While welcoming government claims that the protection of religious minorities in Nigeria “remains an ongoing priority”, Lord Alton criticised the failure of the government to pinpoint Islamist extremism as the cause of the violence.
On X, he wrote that “following yet more deaths today, the refusal to name Jihadism, for what it is, reveals a terrible lack of realism or understanding by [The Foreign and Commonwealth Office] about what is driving the carnage”.
