{"id":34012,"date":"2021-06-11T11:44:59","date_gmt":"2021-06-11T10:44:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=34012"},"modified":"2021-06-11T11:44:59","modified_gmt":"2021-06-11T10:44:59","slug":"the-persecution-of-christians-in-nigeria-demands-our-attention","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=34012","title":{"rendered":"The Persecution of Christians in Nigeria Demands Our Attention"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">By\u00a0<strong>Mike Pompeo<\/strong>, Senior Counsel for Global Affairs<br \/><br \/>Every single day in Nigeria, Christians aren\u2019t just having their right to religious freedom denied \u2013 they are being murdered because of their faith in Jesus.<br \/><br \/>I have\u00a0often spoken\u00a0of the importance of religious liberty to a free society.\u00a0 It is a foundational freedom.\u00a0 No society that denies its people the right to worship according to their beliefs, or that allows that right to come under attack without consequence, can claim to be truly good.\u00a0 Where religious freedom is denied or ignored, you can be sure that tyranny and oppression are soon to follow.\u00a0 That is why a foreign policy that takes seriously the issue of ensuring religious freedom around the world is critical to serving America\u2019s interests. \u00a0It is why the ongoing persecution and martyrdom of Christians in Nigeria demands our attention and action.<br \/><br \/>In 2018, 110 schoolgirls were kidnapped by Boko Haram, a radical jihadist terrorist cell.\u00a0 Eventually, when a deal was cut to return most of the girls home, one was held back \u2013\u00a0Leah Sharibu.\u00a0 This unbelievably brave and faithful girl refused to renounce her faith as a Christian; and for that reason, Boko Haram refused to release her and condemned her to slavery. \u00a0Three years later, she is still being held as a slave by this cowardly terrorist cell in northeast Nigeria.<br \/><br \/>Her story is tragic, infuriating, and emblematic of a troubling trend of Christian persecution in Nigeria.\u00a0\u00a0Open Doors\u2019 Country Report\u00a0notes that today, more Christians are murdered for their faith in Nigeria than in any other country in the world. \u00a0The number of Christians murdered there increased by 60 percent in 2020.\u00a0 The presence of radical, jihadist Islamic groups in northern Nigeria, such as Boko Haram and the Fulani herdsmen, ensures that this ongoing persecution is likely to get worse.\u00a0 I have personally met with Christian Nigerian leaders and heard their tragic stories of those who have been persecuted because of their faith.<br \/><br \/>During the Trump Administration, we took the important first steps toward dealing with this serious issue in December 2020, when we\u00a0added Nigeria\u00a0to the State Department\u2019s \u201cCountries of Particular Concern\u201d (CPC) list.\u00a0 The work that the ACLJ did was very informative for our team at the State Department when we began to evaluate whether or not to designate Nigeria as a CPC.\u00a0 The ACLJ contributed to the data set that underlaid the decision I made.<br \/><br \/>We did this because we recognized reality \u2013 the Nigerian government was tolerating the systematic, ongoing, egregious violations of the religious freedom of its people, allowing them to suffer at the hands of radical Islamic terror.\u00a0 This designation signaled to the Nigerian government that swift action on their part was needed to put an end to this persecution, or there would be further consequences in the form of sanctions and increased diplomatic pressure. Such a designation was part of the broader Trump Administration approach to take seriously violations of religious freedom around the world, which also included\u00a0declaring\u00a0the brutal policies of the Chinese Communist Party toward Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang as genocidal.<br \/><br \/>Unfortunately, the tragedy in Nigeria persists. \u00a0At least 1,500 Christians have already been killed in Nigeria during 2021, and even more have been kidnapped and are either being held hostage or trafficked.\u00a0 The attacks are brutal.\u00a0 Armed radical Islamic groups arrive in a village during the night, kill the men, rape and murder the women, and kidnap the children.\u00a0 The Nigerian government thus far has sought to downplay the attacks, characterizing them as conflicts between herders and farmers rather than as religiously motivated acts of terror.\u00a0 These terrorists must be held accountable for such preposterous characterizations. \u00a0And given that Nigeria has the largest Christian population of any African country \u2013 over 80 million, nearly half of its people \u2013 it is essential that this persecution is snuffed out before it becomes even worse.<br \/><br \/>The ACLJ is actively engaged in the effort to raise awareness of and demand action regarding the ongoing atrocities committed against Christians in Nigeria.\u00a0 It has\u00a0just filed\u00a0its 18th\u00a0written submission\u00a0and made critical\u00a0oral interventions\u00a0at the U.N. Human Rights Council regarding the plight of Christians in Nigeria.\u00a0 I\u2019m eager to engage in this work with them as we seek to put a stop to these ongoing tragedies.<br \/><br \/>What is happening to Christians in Nigeria warrants serious action.\u00a0 America has always stood as a beacon for freedom, and we can only back up that responsibility if we take seriously our obligation to stand up for the rights of religious believers around the world.\u00a0 American civil society and the American government need to hold the Nigerian government accountable for its inaction in allowing terrorist organizations like Boko Haram to fester in their nation.\u00a0 If the problem is allowed to persist, it will only spread and become worse throughout Africa and around the world.\u00a0 The killing must end.<br \/><br \/>\u25aa\ufe0e<strong>Pompeo is the former Secretary of State and former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). This article was published on aclj.com<\/strong><br \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By\u00a0Mike Pompeo, Senior Counsel for Global Affairs Every single day in Nigeria, Christians aren\u2019t just having their right to religious freedom denied \u2013 they are being murdered because of their faith in Jesus. I have\u00a0often spoken\u00a0of the importance of religious liberty to a free society.\u00a0 It is a foundational freedom.\u00a0 No society that denies its [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":14935,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5777],"tags":[1165,249,3523],"class_list":["post-34012","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-features","tag-christians","tag-nigeria","tag-pompeo"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34012","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=34012"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34012\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=34012"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=34012"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=34012"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}