Nigeria is the deadliest country for Christians, with more killed for his or her faith in 2025 than in all other countries combined. Estimates as to what number of have been killed in 2025 alone vary from 3,000 to as many as 7,000.
Startlingly some on the bottom fear that the already high death toll could double this yr if sufficient motion just isn’t taken against the Islamist groups and bandits that plague parts of the country.
The Nigerian president has already declared a state of emergency and announced the doubling of the police force but controversially claimed that Muslims and Christians were equally victims, a claim for which there may be little evidence.
US president Donald Trump has also taken an energetic interest within the plight of Nigerian Christians, declaring Nigeria to be a “Country of Particular Concern” and dramatically ordering airstrikes on the Islamist bases within the country on Christmas Day.
In its Annual Persecution Trends Report, Release International (RI) warned that the situation could still worsen.
An area partner of the group in Nigeria said, “The increase in persecution stems from the unchecked expansion of jihadist groups, fuelled by ideological opposition to Christianity and Western influence, alongside government inaction and inadequate security responses.
“We foresee heightened risks from cross-border incursions by Sahel-based jihadists spilling into Nigeria and expect more Christians to be martyred, with projections exceeding 2025’s deaths if trends proceed. Without swift motion, 2026 could see martyrdoms double if global silence persists.”
RI, a spiritual freedom group, took the upper figure of seven,000 deaths in 2025 as being the accurate one, meaning that if the prediction of their partner is correct, greater than 14,000 Christians could lose their lives next yr.
The same report checked out the situation faced by Christians world wide.
In China, RI said that “the present persecution of Christians as being at its worst because the Cultural Revolution of the Nineteen Sixties and early Nineteen Seventies”.
India, Iran and Afghanistan have also seen a deterioration in religious freedom, while in Europe, Russia was singled out for taking increasingly authoritarian motion against Christians, particularly in areas taken from Ukraine.
The report states: “Under the Russian occupation, Ukrainian Christians have to fulfill underground in small groups.
“The only exception is for many who receive Russian citizenship and re-register under a restrictive Russian religious law.
“At the time of writing the situation within the occupied territories resembled the Soviet Union era.”
 Nigeria is the deadliest country for Christians, with more killed for his or her faith in 2025 than in all other countries combined....){kind=link}