AhlulBayt News Agency

source :
Monday

15 June 2009

7:30:00 PM
164561

Nigeria widens raids into Islamic groups, hundreds detained

The Nigerian police intervened this weekend to peacefully evacuate 4,000 members of the Islamic sect “Darul Islam” in the central region, ten days after the end of bloody fighting with another sect who have caused at least 800 deaths in the north.

Approximately 1,500 police officers came from Abuja to process these operations Saturday in the town of Mokwa, 100 km north of Minna, capital of Niger state (centre), said the police commissioner Mike Zuokumor.

The religious have opposed no resistance and no weapons were seized in their community, he said, explaining that "the operation has been peaceful and aimed to "prevent a religious crisis" similar to the one that had hit the north in recent weeks.

The sect members "are held in a technical college to be questioned about their activities," he said.

More than 800 people died between late July and early August in violent clashes between the army and members of another sect, Boko Haram nicknamed "Taliban" in five northern states.

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