Devil In Action (4) ! Group Boko Haram Attch the Church in Nigerian on Christmash

U.S. Vows to Help Nigeria Find Christmas Bombers

Death toll rises in church attacks blamed on radical Muslim sect.

The United States is offering to help Nigeria track down the Islamic extremists behind Sunday's deadly Christmas bombings, Bloomberg News reports.
“We have been in contact with Nigerian officials about what appear to be terrorist acts and pledge to assist them in bringing those responsible to justice,” White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said in a statement. "We condemn this senseless violence and tragic loss of life on Christmas Day."
The death toll in the most deadly of the attacks—a bombing of a church in the capital, Abuja—has risen to 35, with another 52 wounded, the Associated Press reports. More than 40 are dead in all.
The violence has left worshippers fearful of further attacks. This is the second Christmas in a row that the radical, anti-Western Muslim sect Boko Haram has been blamed for deadly attacks on the Christian holiday. Last year, 32 were killed on Christmas Eve.


UPDATE: The AP's latest report from Nigeria on the Christmas bombings says 39 are dead according to officials, most from a powerful blast at a Catholic church during services.
The delayed response from authorities, who were not able to get enough ambulances and medical professionals to the scene to handle the aftermath of the attacks, has prompted anger and confusion in the vicinity of the explosions.  Read more at the AP's site.

UPDATE: Reuters, reporting from Abuja, Nigeria, puts the death toll from the Christmas day bomb attacks at 27 or more. Boko Haram, an Islamist group responsible for increasingly violent attacks in the country, have claimed the bombings as their work.
According to Reuters, five total bombs exploded in the country:

• In Madalla, near the capital city of Abuja, a bomb explosion in or near a Catholic church killed at least 27 people gathered for Christmas services.
• In Jos, a city at the dividing line between the country's Muslim north and Christian south, an evangelical church was the target of another explosion hours after the Madalla bomb. No deaths reported at this time.
• Many wounded are reported in Gadaka, a northern town, after a bomb was set off a church.
• Residents are reporting two explosions in Damaturu, also in the Muslim north. One of these possibly targeted the region's secret police headquarters. No other details are currently being reported.

Nigerian police found two more explosive devices in Jos, which were deactivated. Police arrested one man in connection to those explosives.
The BBC has a slideshow of photos from the aftermath. For continuing updates, follow @jongambrellAP, who is in Lagos, Nigeria.

UPDATE: The AP is reporting that there's been a third Christmas bombing in Nigeria at the region's secret police headquarters. It looks like the blast was a suicide car bomb.
We'll post here as more details emerge, but follow @jongambrellAP, who is in Lagos, Nigeria, for the latest updates.


POST Sunday, Dec. 25, at 7:32 AM: A bomb blast at a St Theresa's Church in Madalla, near Nigeria's capital city of Abuja, killed at least 25 people and injured many more during Christmas services Sunday. A second bombing in Jos has no reported injuries or deaths.
The AP reports that Boko Haram, an Islamist group loosely modeled on the Taliban, have claimed responsibility for the attacks in an interview Sunday with The Daily Trust, the "newspaper of record" for Nigeria's Muslim population.
The total dead is yet unknown at the chaotic scene of the bombing: while some bodies have been removed from the scene, emergency services said there weren't enough ambulances available to transport the dead and wounded, the AP notes.

"Most of our ambulances have gone to operate on the major highways of the country," National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) spokesman Yushau Shuaibu explained to Reuters earlier this morning. The Catholic church was packed for the holiday, and the blast hit hard enough to blow out windows in neighboring buildings.

The second blast was at Mountain of Fire and Miracles Church in Jos. Jos was the site of multiple bomb blasts on Christmas Eve of last year, killing 32 people. The city is the dividing line between the country's Christian south and Muslim north - the population is roughly evenly divided.

Boko Haram, who want to impose Sharia law on the country, were responsible for last year's attacks in Jos and have already been blamed for killing 465 people in Nigeria this year, the AP explains. Boko Haram's campaign over the past year has been increasingly violent. On Friday, the US Embassy in Abuja issued a warning to citizens, singling out churches as a potential site of violence.