About 5,000 people were displaced in Nigeria as clashes between Christians and Muslims erupted in Jos, a city that saw more than 300 residents killed during a similar uprising in 2008. Twenty-six people were dead and 69 injured as rioters burned mosques and homes, local Red Cross official Auwal Muhammad Madobi said. He said he had no information about deaths and police officials declined to offer a count of the dead. The rioting began Sunday, when angry Muslim youths attacked and set fire to a church, said Gregory Yenlong, a state government spokesman. Yenlong said he did not know why the young men set the blaze. “That’s what’s being investigated,” he said. Police arrested 35 people who they suspect took part in the rioting, Yenlong said. He said at least five of the men arrested were wearing fake Nigerian military uniforms. Nigerian security forces cordoned off the district of the city. “We have received 16 dead bodies since yesterday. Eleven of them were buried yesterday and we are conducting a funeral for the remaining five. So far we have over 300 injured people, most of them from gunshots,” the head of the central mosque of Jos, Balarabe Dawud, told AFP. agencies
Jan192010