Report: Christians Bear Nigeria's Heaviest Persecution Toll

A new six-year study is adding fresh data to a crisis that church leaders, human rights advocates and religious freedom groups have warned about for years: Christians in Nigeria continue to bear a disproportionate share of the country's deadly violence.

The report, Killings and Abductions in Nigeria (2020–2025), released June 30 by the Observatory for Religious Freedom in Africa (ORFA), examined more than six years of violence between Oct. 1, 2019, and Sept. 30, 2025. Researchers concluded that Christians suffered significantly higher levels of killings and abductions than their Muslim counterparts, even though both religious communities have been targeted by terrorist groups operating across the country.

According to the report, nearly 79,323 people were killed and almost 35,000 were abducted during the study period in attacks linked to terrorist groups. ORFA said its findings challenge longstanding assumptions about the primary drivers of violence in Nigeria, concluding that armed groups it classifies as Fulani Terror Groups were responsible for a substantially larger share of civilian deaths than Boko Haram and the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP).

The findings were highlighted recently by The Baptist Paper, which reported that Nigerian Christians are "suffering disproportionately compared to Muslim victims in targeted killings and massacres spearheaded by Nigeria's Islamic terror groups."

The violence is far from new.

For more than a decade, Nigeria has ranked among the world's most dangerous countries for Christians. Islamist insurgencies led by Boko Haram and ISWAP, combined with escalating attacks by armed Fulani militants in parts of central Nigeria, have left thousands dead, displaced entire communities and destroyed churches, schools and homes. Religious freedom organizations have repeatedly warned that the scale of violence has continued despite international attention. (Baptist Press)

Earlier this year, the 2026 World Watch List published by Open Doors ranked Nigeria as the world's deadliest country for Christians. The organization reported that 3,490 Christians were killed for their faith during its reporting period—more than in all other countries combined—and cited widespread kidnappings, church attacks and forced displacement.

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom has likewise documented continuing attacks by non-state actors, including Boko Haram, ISWAP and Fulani militants. In a May report, the commission said Fulani militant groups have carried out "some of the most notorious, visible, and deadly attacks" on religious communities in Nigeria, "often but not exclusively against Christians." The commission continues to recommend that Nigeria remain designated a Country of Particular Concern for religious freedom violations.

At the same time, both ORFA and USCIRF note that Muslim civilians have also suffered heavily from terrorist violence, underscoring the complexity of the conflict even as Christians have experienced a disproportionate burden in many of the hardest-hit regions.

The ORFA report argues that understanding victims' religious identity is essential to accurately measuring the violence and crafting effective responses. Researchers say earlier analyses often failed to distinguish between religious communities, masking the extent to which Christians have been affected.

The full ORFA report, including its methodology, data tables and maps, is available through the organization's website at THIS LINK.