The Biden Administration has betrayed the Nigerian people once again. In what has become a regrettable annual tradition, Biden’s State Department recently rejected calls from numerous leading human rights, religious freedom, and Christian organizations to redesignate Nigeria as a “Country of Particular Concern” (CPC).
The CPC list is one of the United States government’s main tools promoting global religious freedom. Any nation that engages in or allows “particularly severe violations” of religious freedom can be added to the list. The designation gives the U.S. Government the ability to leverage sanctions against offending nations.
The State Department regularly includes countries on the CPC list that are known enemies of the United States such as North Korea, Cuba, China, and Iran. There’s no risk in calling them out. But the Biden administration continuously refuses to add Nigeria and several other countries for geopolitical and economic reasons. Not only does this politicize the CPC list, if not render it meaningless, but it exposes the Administration’s inability to truly support religious freedom around the globe.
If Nigeria doesn’t belong on the CPC, then I’m not sure who does. In 2022 alone, more than 5,000 Nigerian Christians were massacred in multiple waves of attacks, and another 1,041 were slaughtered in the first 100 days of 2023. This past Christmas, attacks on 26 Nigerian villages left nearly 200 dead with many more missing. Unbelievably, the State Department’s decision to leave Nigeria off the CPC list was made just days after these horrific attacks took place.
I recently traveled to Nigeria and met with Christians who have lost everything at the hands of Boko Haram, Fulani extremists, and other terrorists. Their family members have been killed, their homes and villages destroyed, their farms burned, and livestock stolen. The trauma and pain these survivors face are incredibly deep and painful. And yet, month after month, year after year, we allow these violent acts to continue.