Gunmen kill 25 in restive central Nigeria state

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Gunmen killed 25 people in two attacks across north-central Nigeria's Benue state over the weekend, local authorities told AFP Monday, the latest violence in a region known for deadly land disputes and reprisals.

Attackers killed 14 people on Sunday in the community of Ankpali, said Adam Ochega, chairman of the Apa local government council, warning that "there are still some threats here and there".

Muslim ethnic Fulani nomadic herders have long clashed with settled farmers, many of whom are Christian, in Benue over access to land and resources.

In a recent report, Amnesty International tallied 6,896 people killed over the last two years in Benue, part of Nigeria's so-called Middle Belt, a mixed-religious region where such disputes often take on a sectarian dimension.

A police spokeswoman confirmed the attack but did not provide a toll.

Contacted by telephone, resident Ajija Moses said the attackers stormed the community around 6:00 pm, blaming armed Fulani men who were "shooting sporadically".

In a similar attack Sunday evening on Naka village, of Gwer West local government area, 11 people were killed by what authorities said were suspected Fulani militias.

"So far we have recovered 11 dead bodies and five people are confirmed injured," Gwer West council chairman Ormin Victor told AFP.

Last month, 44 people were killed in a span of four days in Gwer West.

Motives for the violence in that attack were not clear, but Victor blamed the "coordinated attacks" on Fulani cattle herders.

Resident Amineh Vincent said the village continued to live in fear.

"The attackers invaded our community... were shooting anyhow, they killed many people," he told AFP.

The attackers don't "want us to cultivate our lands, they keeping on attacking and killing us," he alleged.

Deadly competition for land

Herders across the region say they are also the victims of deadly attacks by farmers, land grabs and cattle poisonings.

Land used by farmers and herders in central Nigeria is coming under stress from climate change and human expansion, sparking deadly competition for increasingly limited space.

Benue has been one of the states hit hardest by such violence between nomadic herders and farmers who blame herdsmen for destroying farmland with their cattle grazing.

When violence flares, weak policing all but guarantees indiscriminate reprisal attacks, which often occur across communal lines.

A spate of attacks across Benue and neighbouring Plateau state left more than 150 people dead in April alone.

Land grabbing, political and economic tensions between locals and those considered outsiders, as well as an influx of hardline Muslim and Christian preachers, have heightened divisions in Plateau state in recent decades.