US President Donald Trump today accused Nigerian authorities of crimes against Christians and threatened that the United States could “go into” the African country.
“If the Nigerian Government continues to allow the killing of Christians, the U.S.A. will immediately stop all aid and assistance to Nigeria, and may very well go into that now disgraced country, ‘guns-a-blazing,’ to completely wipe out the Islamic Terrorists who are committing these horrible atrocities,” Trump posted on his social network Truth Social.
He instructed the American “Department of War to prepare for possible action.”
“If we attack, it will be fast, vicious, and sweet, just like the terrorist thugs attack our cherished Christians,” the US President stated.
He warned the Nigerian government that it “must move fast.” The warning of possible military action followed a sharp response earlier today from Nigerian President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to Trump’s post a day earlier, which declared the West African country a “Country of Particular Concern” for its alleged failure to curb the persecution of Christians.
Tinubu stated that the characterization of Nigeria as a religiously intolerant country does not reflect the national reality.2
“Religious freedom and tolerance have been a core tenet of our collective identity and shall always rema3in so. Nigeria opposes religious persecution and does not encourage it. Nigeria is a country with constitutional guarantees to protect citizens of all faiths,” he said.
Trump had said on Friday that “Christianity is facing an existential threat in Nigeria” and that “radical Islamists are responsible for this mass slaughter.”
Trump’s comment came a few weeks after US Senator Ted Cruz urged Congress to designate Africa’s most populous country as a violator of religious freedom, citing claims of the “mass murder of Christians.”
Nigeria has 220 million inhabitants and is almost equally divided between Christians and Muslims. The country has long faced insecurity on various fronts, including the extremist group Boko Haram, which seeks to impose its radical interpretation of Islamic law.
Source: Euronews, Photo: AP