afrol News, 19 January - Nigerian security forces have began an intensive security patrol in the Jos city in Plateau State where Muslim and Christian clashes have killed more than 12 people on Sunday, prompting the government to impose the dusk to dawn curfew.

Local news reports said police and military officers were deployed and a 12 hour dusk-to-dawn curfew imposed in the Nassarawa Gwom district after Sunday's clashes over the building of a mosque.

Plateau State police spokesperson Mohammed Lerema said security personnel have succeeded in quelling the unrest and restoring calm in the affected area of the city.

"We have cordoned the Nassarawa Gwom district as a strategy to prevent the violence from spilling over to other parts of the city," he said.

The violence broke out on Sunday morning between rival Christian and Muslim gangs, setting fire to mosques, churches and other buildings. Sunday's clashes reportedly erupted after Christian youths protested against the building of a mosque in the Christian-dominated Nassarawa Gwom district of the city.

In November 2008 hundreds of people were killed in two days of violence triggered by a rumour that the majority-Muslim All Nigeria People’s Party had lost a local election to the mainly Christian Peoples Democratic Party. Soldiers and policemen were brought in to restore order.

More than 200 ethnic groups generally live peacefully side by side in the West African country, although civil war left one million people dead between 1967 and 1970 and there have been bouts of religious unrest since then.

Nigeria, Africa's most populous country with about 150-million people, is evenly divided between the mainly Muslim north and mainly Christian south.

By staff writer

© afrol News

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