JOS, Nigeria (AFP) – Nigerian troops were on Tuesday patrolling tense villages near the troubled city of Jos after the massacre of more than 500 Christians as survivors fled the threat of further violence.
Women and children were hacked to death or burned alive in their homes in the latest massacre. Survivors have accused the authorities of intervening too late.
Thousands have been killed in recent years in strife in and around Jos, which is on the dividing line between the largely Muslim north and Christian dominated south.
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Witnesses blamed the latest massacre on the mainly Muslim Fulani ethnic group. According to media reports, Muslim villagers were warned by text message to leave two days before attack.
Security forces said they had detained 95 suspects in the violence, and acting president Goodluck Jonathan has sacked his chief security advisor but fears abound of either more attacks by the Fulani or of Christian reprisals.
With a six-month-old baby strapped on her back, Patricia Silas, 30, and her two neighbours escaped from Tin-Tin village late on Monday after funerals which saw scores of bodies of women, children and men buried in mass graves.
"We are fleeing our village because we are afraid we might be the next target of attack by these Fulani," she told AFP.
"They have been making phone calls warning they are going to attack. We take these threats seriously, we don't want to be caught off-guard," she added.
She says the threats came from Fulanis who used to live in their village but left after the outbreak of violence January which left at least 326 people dead.
"They are saying they want to avenge their loss," said Silas, whose village also suffered during January's attacks, when mainly Muslims were killed by suspected Christian activists.
As relatives attended funerals for the victims of the three-hour orgy of violence in three Christian villages, men huddled in small groups at Dogo Nahawa. One young man was overheard saying: "We will take revenge". Related article: Survivors' pain as victims buried
Officials said more than 500 people -- mainly women and children -- were hacked to death with machetes, axes and daggers in three villages of Dogo Nahawa, Ratsat and Zot, south of Jos city
Tensions ran high on Monday with a soldier shot dead while trying to calm Berom Christian youths in Bukuru town, 20 kilometres (13 miles) south of Jos.
"He is from there and he was appealing for calm in their local language when someone from the crowd shot him a close range," a military source told AFP.
The military on Monday shot dead a student taking part in a demonstration in downtown Jos after he ignored orders from the army to stop, witnesses said.
Nigeria's main opposition Action Congress (AC) accused the federal government of "hypocrisy in its reaction to the latest violence in Jos".
"Concrete action to stop the cycle of impunity, rather than crocodile tears, will end the violence," it said.
The AC said perpetrators of violence in recent years in Jos and its environs have not been brought to justice.
"With the mass burial of the victims, the issue is buried until the violence flares up again. That is why the perpetrators are encouraged to continue their dastardly act," said AC.
The weekend violence was just the latest between rival ethnic and religious groups.
Locals said Sunday's attacks were the result of a feud which had been first ignited by a theft of cattle and then fuelled by deadly reprisals.
Rights activists also said the slaughter appeared to be revenge for the January attacks, in which mainly Muslims were killed
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