LAGOS, May 5: Nigeria's top Islamic leader said on Wednesday that 300 people, mostly Muslims, were killed by ethnic Tarok Christians in an attack on the central town of Yelwa last Sunday.

Justice Abdul kadir Orire, secretary-general of the Jama'atu Nasril Islam, described the killings with machineguns in the remote farming town as "genocide". He said 700 to 800 people had now been killed in three months of ethnic violence in central Nigeria.

"The information we have is that 300 people died and they are mostly Muslims. We call it a genocide because they are killing women and children," Orire said in an interview from his headquarters. -Reuters

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