Nigeria: Lesser known terror groups have ‘tacit approval’

An average of seven deadly terror attacks took place every day in Nigeria in recent years, but much of the blame goes to the wrong parties and does not acknowledge that the country is “incubating a terror network”, according to new research.

A six-year study released by the Observatory for Religious Freedom in Africa (ORFA) revealed that 79,323 people were killed in Nigeria between 2020 and 2025, with more than 42,000 victims believed to be innocent civilians.

The study is another indicator of the scale of persecution towards Christians in Nigeria, with the research finding that twice as many Christians were killed during the research period as Muslims, having huge impacts on the populations of predominantly Christian communities.