Nigeria uses army to quell Muslim-Christian violence

LAGOS, Nigeria -- President Olusegun Obasanjo called out the army Saturday to combat Muslim-Christian violence raging in a northern Nigerian city, where terrified residents told of churches and homes burned and bodies piling up in the streets.

Authorities in Jos, a hilltop city of 4 million, imposed a dawn-to-dusk curfew to quell the fighting, which erupted Friday night at the time of Muslim prayers -- some said, when a Christian woman angered Muslims by trying to cross a street where Muslim men were kneeled over in prayer.

There was no word from overwhelmed local police on the death toll in the city 620 miles northeast of Nigeria's commercial capital, Lagos.

But residents cowering in homes with their families Saturday spoke of seeing dozens of bodies -- and the bloodletting continuing.

"It just started raining -- so I looked outside, and saw three corpses lying in front of my house," one woman, Susan Akele, reported by telephone. "This is hell."

Obasanjo authorized the deployment of the army and went on state radio Saturday to appeal to religious and community leaders to assure that "peace reigns supreme in Jos."

"I wonder what sort of Muslims and Christians start burning churches and mosques -- places where God is worshipped," Obasanjo said. "True believers in God cannot start killing other human beings."

The explosion of violence is the latest since the introduction of sharia, or Islamic law, in several northern states last year sparked bloody clashes between Christians and Muslims. Hundreds have died.

Nigeria, with 120 million people Africa's most populous nation, is divided into the predominantly Christian south and overwhelmingly Muslim north. Northerners dominate Nigeria's military, and wielded immense power during the 15 years of army rule, which ended in 1999 with Obasanjo's election.