Fulani herdsmen on Monday killed at least 10 Christians, including a Pentecostal pastor, in Benue state, Nigeria, residents said.
The Rev. Simon Nbach of Flaming Fire Ministry and the other Christians were massacred in the attack on Anwule Oglewu village of Ohimini County as farmers were working in their fields, residents said. The assailants also burned down a Catholic Church building and destroyed dozens of homes.
“The pastor’s corpse has been found, alongside two other corpses of two other Christians, Adoya Ejigai, and Ejeh Loko,” area resident Casmir Eigege told Christian Daily International-Morning Star News. “So far, 10 Christians have been confirmed dead, and one other Christian was abducted by the herdsmen.”
Eigege identified the attackers as Fulani herdsmen.
Village resident Ojay Ojonya said he lost relatives in the assault.
“My uncle and my cousin are victims of the invasion and killing by the armed Fulani herdsmen in Anwule community of Ohimini Local Church Area of Benue State,” Ojonya told Christian Daily International-Morning Star News. “Lord, please come to our aid.”
Area resident Paul Vershima said the assault went on until 5 pm Tuesday, and confirmed the deaths of at least 10 Christians.
“At least 10 Christian have been killed, with several others still missing, following a brutal attack by Fulani herdsmen on Anwule community in Ohimini Local Government Area of Benue state,” Vershima said. “During the attack, the herdsmen unleashed widespread violence on Christians. The herdsmen set ablaze many houses, including a Catholic Church worship building.”
Numbering in the millions across Nigeria and the Sahel, predominantly Muslim Fulani comprise hundreds of clans of many different lineages who do not hold extremist views, but some Fulani do adhere to radical Islamist ideology, the United Kingdom’s All-Party Parliamentary Group for International Freedom or Belief (APPG) noted in a 2020 report.
“They adopt a comparable strategy to Boko Haram and ISWAP and demonstrate a clear intent to target Christians and potent symbols of Christian identity,” the APPG report states.
Christian leaders in Nigeria have said they believe herdsmen attacks on Christian communities in Nigeria’s Middle Belt are inspired by their desire to forcefully take over Christians’ lands and impose Islam as desertification has made it difficult for them to sustain their herds.
Nigeria remained among the most dangerous places on earth for Christians, according to Open Doors’ 2025 World Watch List of the countries where it is most difficult to be a Christian. Of the 4,476 Christians killed for their faith worldwide during the reporting period, 3,100 (69 percent) were in Nigeria, according to the WWL.
“The measure of anti-Christian violence in the country is already at the maximum possible under World Watch List methodology,” the report stated.
In the country’s North-Central zone, where Christians are more common than they are in the North-East and North-West, Islamic extremist Fulani militia attack farming communities, killing many hundreds, Christians above all, according to the report. Jihadist groups such as Boko Haram and the splinter group Islamic State in West Africa Province (ISWAP), among others, are also active in the country’s northern states, where federal government control is scant and Christians and their communities continue to be the targets of raids, sexual violence, and roadblock killings, according to the report. Abductions for ransom have increased considerably in recent years.
The violence has spread to southern states, and a new jihadist terror group, Lakurawa, has emerged in the northwest, armed with advanced weaponry and a radical Islamist agenda, the WWL noted. Lakurawa is affiliated with the expansionist Al-Qaeda insurgency Jama’a Nusrat ul-Islam wa al-Muslimin, or JNIM, originating in Mali.
Nigeria ranked seventh on the 2025 WWL list of the 50 countries where it is most difficult to be a Christian.
