London service for Taliban victims: CEN 9.11.09 p 8.

The Church of Nigeria’s London chaplaincy in conjunction with the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria has organized services of remembrance for the victims of the Boko Haram, the Nigerian Taliban.

On Sept 11 services will be held at St. Marylebone parish in London and the Abuja Ecumenical Centre in Nigeria to commemorate those who died in last month’s anti-Christian violence in Northern Nigeria.

Twenty churches, including Immanuel Anglican Church, Gamboru-Ngala in the Diocese of Maiduguri were destroyed in the uprising by members of the militant Muslim sect and almost 1000 people died in five days of fighting that ended on Aug 6 after the sect’s leader Ustaz Muhammed Yusuf was killed while attempting to escape from the police.

Among the dead were 12 Christians who were martyred for their faith. Seized by Boko Haram and commanded to renounce their faith and convert to Islam or die. Nine laymen and three Evangelical ministers: Pastor Sabo Yakubu, the Rev. Sylvester Akpan and the Rev. George Orji refused. They were then beheaded.

Canon Ben Enwuchola, the organizers of the London service said “in 1987, I ferried victims of religious violence from the university in Kano to hospital. It is shocking that over twenty years later, Nigeria’s cyclical religious violence has neither been recognised nor adequately addressed.”

“We hope by this event to raise greater awareness of the suffering of the Christian community of northern and central Nigeria, and are asking Christians in the UK to join us in prayers for the victims of the recent violence, and for lasting peace and reconciliation between the religious communities of northern and central Nigeria,” he said.

Stuart Windsor, National Director of CSW said his organization was “privileged to stand in solidarity with the victims of violence in Nigeria and recognizes that their suffering has been compounded by the lack of national and international attention.”