The death toll from the weekend’s violence in Nigeria’s Plateau State continued to rise. On Monday evening, December 25, local authorities in this central Nigerian state reported at least 160 dead victims of attacks in three districts: Mangu, Bokkos and Barkin-Ladi.
The first outbreaks of violence were reported on Saturday evening, and continued on Sunday and again on Monday. Attacks perpetrated by armed men against rural communities, according to Amnesty International Nigeria. The organization condemns the failure of the federal authorities to protect the population.
At the local level, according to the Chairman of the Bokkos Government Council, the attackers are members of criminal gangs, known in Nigeria as “bandits”. They attacked more than twenty villages between Saturday evening and Monday morning in his constituency, according to Monday Kassah.
Coordinated attacks, left at least 160 people dead, but also more than three hundred wounded who were transferred to hospitals in Bokkos, Barkin-Ladi and the Plateau State capital, Jos, which lies to the north of the murdered constituencies.
In Barkin-Ladi, an elected member of the local assembly spoke of at least four villages being attacked.
Amnesty is calling on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to carry out an impartial and effective investigation into the motives behind these attacks in Plateau State, which has already been plunged into mourning several times in the past by deadly violence between Christian and Muslim communities, or between herders and farmers.