Ted Cruz, a US senator, has alleged that Nigerian officials are complicit in facilitating “the mass murder” of Christians in the West African nation.
Cruz spoke on Tuesday during a senate foreign relations
subcommittee hearing titled ‘The US approach to counterterrorism in Africa’.
In his submission, the lawmaker claimed that “more
Christians are killed for their faith in Nigeria than anywhere else in the
world”.
“Since 2009, Islamic jihadists have murdered more than
50,000 Christians in Nigeria and more than 20,000 churches, schools, and
religious institutions have been destroyed, most burned to the ground,” he
said.
“Nigerian officials had been, unfortunately, complicit in
facilitating these atrocities.”
He blamed the implementation of Sharia law, applied in a
dozen northern Nigerian states, as a driver of violence.
The senator added that the US government has identified
complicit Nigerian officials at local and federal levels, and would hold them
accountable.
Cruz also accused Nigerian authorities of slow-paced
response to tackling the country’s security challenges.
“Last year, I met with a delegation of top Nigerian defence
and security officials. They said they were committed to ending the violence,”
he said.
“I told them I would judge their commitment by the results.
“Those results have yet to materialise.”
In October, Cruz proposed the ‘Nigeria Religious Freedom
Accountability Act of 2025’, a legislation he said would hold Nigerian
government officials accountable for “facilitating the mass murder of
Christians”.
‘NIGERIA COOPERATING WITH US’
Posing a question to Nick Checker, head of the state
department’s bureau of African affairs, Cruz asked if meetings between Nigerian
and American officials have yielded results since President Donald Trump’s
redesignation of the country in response to allegations of a Christian
genocide.
Checker said Nigeria has been broadly responsive to US
requests since the designation took effect.
“We’ve seen some positive movements to include leadership
changes in Nigerian security services, security deployments, including the
recruitment of 50,000 additional troops and the deployment of forest guards to
the middle belt area where we’ve seen a lot of this anti-Christian violence as
well as increased prosecution for folks accused of terrorism as well,” Checker
said.
“So the United States does welcome Nigeria’s initial
response.”
Checker also pointed to the bilateral high level working
group formed earlier this year after a meeting between a Nigerian delegation
led by Nuhu Ribadu, national security adviser (NSA), and a US delegation led by
Allison Hooker, under-secretary of state.
The state department official said US recent support of
Nigerian forces was also proof of cooperation between both countries.
“We’ve seen positive steps by the Nigerians, but certainly
more can be done,” he said.
Checker said the US would continue to hold Nigeria’s feet to
the fire to make sure more changes are effected.
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