![\"boko\"](\"http:\/\/www.amroha.co.in\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/boko-300x199.jpg\")
<\/p>\nMoulana Mohammed Ali Johar had once said: \u201cQatl-e-ay Hussain (AS) asal men marg-e-Yezid haid, Islam zindah hota hai har Karbala ke baad.\u201d Even if I refrain from delving into the past 1400 years and confine myself to recent past only, there are numerous barbaric incidences when the minority Muslim minority Shias, have been systematically massacred with unprecedented brutality in various parts of Muslims world. From the mindless and horrific killing of innocent school boys in Pakistan to latest pogroms of Shia Muslims in Nigeria, we witness the resurrection of the old story of \u2018Martyrdom of Karbala.\u2019 The masks and tricks of perpetrators change but the Yezid appears again and again in different form – each time more macabre than before.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
On last Saturday the bloodshed took place in the ancient mud-walled city of Zaria in northern Nigeria in which hundreds of Shias were killed by Nigerian army. The army put up an excuse that followers of Shia scholar Ayatullah Zakzaky allegedly hurled stones at a military convoy carrying the country’s new top general, Tukur Buratai.<\/p>\n
Way back in May 2013, I had written an article in the portal \u2018Merinews\u2019 about the game of blood- shed played by militant Talibani organization \u2018Boko Haram\u2019 of Nigeria and I\u2019m reproducing here a part of it to link it with the present crisis:<\/p>\n
\u201cFedreal Republic of Nigerian is located in West Africa the Nigeria was taken from the Niger river which runs through the country. In the late nineteenth century it was colonized by Britishers. The new rulers followed the old feudal system of traditional chiefs and fiefdoms. It got independence in 1960. Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa was the first Prime Minister who was respected widely. Unfortunately, for the country and for the African continent that ebullient politician could not hold the rein of power for long and Nigeria fell to military junta. A civil war followed as the region of Biafra tried to establish independence. Military governments in times of crisis have alternated with democratically elected governments. Nigeria is also known as “the Giant of Africa.” Half of the population of country follows Islam and Muslims are mostly concentrated in north while rest are Christians and Yoruba religion. They mostly live in the South and central parts of the country. Nigerian has large oil reserves and good wealth of minerals. It is fertile and beautiful country with tall and healthy people.\u201d\u2026end of the quote.<\/p>\n
Nigeria is a heavily Muslim country, and the overwhelming majority of Nigerian Muslims are Sunni. There were insignificant small pockets of Shia Muslims and by most accounts Shia Islam had little presence in Nigeria until the Islamic Revolution in 1979. The Iranian revolution of 1979 inspired many northern Nigerian Muslims. A Shia priest, Ibrahim Zakzaky who had been trained in Shia theology in Iran aggressively preached the Shia doctrine of Islam in Nigeria and found many followers. The movement that\u00a0was led by Ayatullah Ibrahim Zakzaky became popular in northern Nigeria since the early ’80s. Its stated mission was to establish an Iran type of Islamic state in Nigeria and the ideology caused consternation in the top echelons of Nigerian government and led to several intermittent skirmishes with government security forces in past.<\/p>\n
Ayatullah Zakzaki\u2019s own Zaria-based sect, which is known as the Shia Islamic movement, is believed to account for the majority of Shia Muslims in Nigeria. It is claimed by army that Ayatullah Zakzaky brought “millions” of followers onto the streets and he does command a hardcore of disciples who have allegedly received paramilitary training. He had been thrown in jail in the past also on charges of stirring up violence between Muslims and Christians.<\/p>\n
According to Mr. Michael Olufemi Sodipo, the founder of Nigeria’s Peace Initiative Network, the puritanical tendency among [Muslims and Christians] in northern Nigeria gave rise to increasingly zealous political actors. It was alleged that the followers of Ayatullah Zakzaki acquired weapons also but the group had never taken up arms against Nigeria’s secular government.<\/p>\n
The non-official observers reported that the latest conflagration developed as a large Shia demonstration, led by the Zakzaky\u2019s Islamic Movement, took place on the Sokoto road, near Zaria, where the Islamic Movement has a large presence. Around this time, Buratai’s convoy was driving through. The military demanded that the demonstrators disperse, and they refused. Some sort of projectile then struck Buratai’s car (reports conflict as to what it was), and the soldiers fired into the air as a warning. When that didn’t work, according to SBM, “the military opened fire to cover their principal, after which they left the location.” The military’s crackdown on the Islamic Movement began shortly afterward. According to SBM, the military saw the incident as an excuse to finally crush the Islamic Movement, which it had long seen as a threat.<\/p>\n
Amnesty International said in a statement on Tuesday evening that the shooting of members of the Shia group in Zaria “must be urgently investigated … and anyone found responsible for unlawful killings must be brought to justice”.<\/p>\n
“While the final death toll is unclear, there is no doubt of that there has been a substantial loss of life at the hands of the military,” said MK Ibrahim, director of Amnesty International, Nigeria.<\/p>\n
“Armed policemen ambushed the procession unprovoked and threw tear gas into the crowd before opening fire, killing four people and injuring 25,” said Ibrahim Musa, a spokesman for the Shia Islamic Movement. “Despite the unwarranted attack, the march forged ahead.” Musa said soldiers on Monday carried away about 200 bodies from around Zakzaky’s home in Zaria, and hundreds more corpses are in the mortuary. The cleric himself also suffered four bullet wounds and is now understood to be in Nigerian military custody.<\/p>\n
Human rights activists said hundreds, perhaps as many as 1,000, have been killed.\u00a0Iran has also complained to Nigeria over an army raid on the headquarters of a militant pro-Iranian cleric in which hundreds of people are now feared to have died. The Iranian President, Hassan Rouhani, has demanded an explanation by the Nigerian government for its crackdown on the Shia Muslim sect led by Ibrahim Zakzaky.<\/p>\n
Those concerns appeared to be shared by the US ambassador to Nigeria, James Entwhistle, who also called for an investigation into misconduct by all parties.<\/p>\n
The confrontation is yet another security headache for Nigeria’s new president, Muhammadu Buhari, who took power in May promising to improve security in northern Nigeria. Some 10,000 people have died in recent years there in attacks by the Boko Haram Islamist group. But with his security forces already facing stiff challenges in northern Nigeria, Mr Buhari appears to have little time for any group who threatens the rule of law. Nigeria’s military also has a long reputation for human rights abuses, which is often said to have fuelled local support for Boko Haram.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Moulana Mohammed Ali Johar had once said: \u201cQatl-e-ay Hussain (AS) asal men marg-e-Yezid haid, Islam zindah hota hai har Karbala ke baad.\u201d Even if I refrain from delving into the past 1400 years and confine myself to recent past only, there are numerous barbaric incidences when the minority Muslim minority Shias, have been systematically massacred […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":338,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1686","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.amroha.co.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1686","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.amroha.co.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.amroha.co.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.amroha.co.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/338"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.amroha.co.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1686"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"http:\/\/www.amroha.co.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1686\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1704,"href":"http:\/\/www.amroha.co.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1686\/revisions\/1704"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.amroha.co.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1686"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.amroha.co.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1686"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.amroha.co.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1686"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}