Fulani herdsmen in eastern Nigeria killed 10 Christians in four villages on Saturday night (Jan. 10) and into the predawn hours of Sunday, sources said.
The assailants attacked the predominantly Christian villages of Iornem, Kyahar, Uhula and Samgambe in Taraba state’s Donga County, said Orlaer William, a resident of the area.
“The communities in Donga Local Government Area were attacked and burned down by Fulani militias,” William told Christian Daily International-Morning Star News. “Ten Christians have been killed, this I can confirm. The Fulani militias are still launching more attacks in other nearby Christian villages as I send this message to you this morning, Sunday.”
The cluster of communities is about eight kilometers (five miles) from Donga town, he said.
“No intervention from security services yet, and the Christian victims are left at the mercy of God,” William said.
Area resident Kpeibee Twin confirmed the attacks, as did another, Mercy Emmanuel.
“When are we going to have peace in Taraba state?” Emmanuel asked in a message to Christian Daily International-Morning Star News. “Oh God, have mercy on us.”
Added resident Adegwa Uba, “Your prayers are needed for us living in Donga Local Government Area of Taraba state.”
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 worst countries for Christians.
