According to reports by Catholic aid organisations and eyewitnesses, the night of 12 June in the Nigerian village of Yelwata saw a brutal massacre, in which 200 Christians were killed. Victims were shot, burned alive, and entire families were slaughtered in their homes. The attackers arrived in the village on motorcycles, shouting “Allahu Akbar” as they set fire to shelters and opened fire on those fleeing.

The Catholic aid organisation Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) confirmed the death toll, stating that

the victims included infants, children, and entire families.

“Bodies were lying everywhere,” said Ukuma Jonathan Angbianbee, the village priest. According to the Catholic News Agency (CNA), the police repelled the initial attack on the local church. The attackers then turned on shelters housing displaced people, dousing them in petrol and setting them alight.

“Some of the bodies were burned beyond recognition,”

– reported ACN. Amnesty International also confirmed that families were locked inside their homes and burned alive.

A Horrific Massacre

Pope Leo XIV described the events as a “horrific massacre” and prayed for the victims.

Despite extreme persecution, the Catholic Church continues to grow in the country, with record numbers attending mass. Most of the victims of this recent atrocity were internally displaced persons being sheltered by the local Catholic mission,

– according to the Vatican News portal.

Before reciting the Angelus prayer on Sunday, the Pope prayed for “security, justice and peace” in Nigeria, adding that he was thinking especially of the “rural Christian communities in Benue State,” who have been victims of terrible violence.

German Public Media Downplays the Massacre

Despite multiple reports confirming the religiously motivated targeting of Christians, the German state broadcaster ZDF downplayed the massacre. Rather than addressing the religiously based targeting of Christians,

ZDF attributed the violence mainly to factors such as climate change, demographic pressure, and disputes over farmland.

Critics have accused ZDF of deliberately omitting the role of religious tensions from its reporting and instead focusing ideologically on climate change, as highlighted by The European Conservative news site.

Hungary Helps

The daily Magyar Nemzet reported that the

Hungarian government is providing emergency humanitarian aid worth 25,000 US dollars to Christian communities attacked in Nigeria’s Benue State.

The announcement was made by Tristan Azbej, state secretary at the Hungarian ministry of foreign affairs and trade, responsible for programmes assisting persecuted Christians. He stated that “in Nigeria’s Benue State, within the diocese of Makurdi, Christian internally displaced persons were attacked – people who had already fled earlier violence.”

Even churches offered no refuge to the displaced; the attackers killed children, women and men alike, using machetes and other weapons. The state secretary emphasised:

This tragedy is not an isolated case, but part of a more severe, global problem. He pointed out that Christians are persecuted in many parts of the world and that in Nigeria alone, more than 4,000 Christians were killed in 2024. However, as he put it, this reality is ignored or denied by many Western governments and aid organisations.

“This denial must end. Hungary stands by persecuted Christians and expects the international community to protect Christian lives and human dignity,” he said.