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Police in the western Nigerian state of Niger have raided an Islamic community and detained hundreds of its members, weeks after a crackdown into a group killed almost 800 in the remote northeast.
Niger state police commissioner Mike Zuokumor said officers backed by reinforcements from the capital Abuja had surrounded the compound of the Darul Islam community on the edge of the town of Mokwa early on Saturday.
Police and immigration officers were screening about 600 members of the group who had been detained and taken to a nearby school for questioning, police spokesman Richard Oguche said.
Local journalists said as many as 3,000 people were believed to live in the community.
Zuokumor said the arrests were "peaceful and no shots were fired."
Zuokumor said police wanted to find out more about the beliefs of Darul Islam and that any members found to be from neighboring countries would be deported.
"Social ills"
The leader of the group, Amrul Bashir Abdullahi, originally from the northern state of Kano, told reporters after being detained that he had lived in Mokwa for 17 years.
"We are not against Western education as we are being accused, but we have our own belief which is not in any way an infringement of the state authorities," he said.
"We decided to create a camp for ourselves outside the community because of the problems in the larger society. These are problems of corruption, drunkenness, prostitution and so on which Allah forbids," Abullahi said.
"We believe ... that we should distance ourselves from the world and serve Allah diligently without being polluted with the ills of society," Abdullahi said.
Raids against Islamic groups
Clashes three weeks ago between the security forces and members of a group called Boko Haram killed close to 800 people in the northeastern city of Maiduguri, more than 800 km (500 miles) away from Niger state.
Since 1999 and the return of a civilian regime to Nigeria's central government, 12 northern states have introduced Islamic Sharia law.
Mohammed Yusuf, the leader of the Nigerian Islamic group, Boko Haram, was shot dead while in police detention. International rights groups condemned what they said appeared to be an extra-judicial, execution-style killing.
PHOTO CAPTION
A building is seen in flames after reportedly being set ablaze by Nigerian soldiers in Maiduguri, July 30, 2009.
Agencies
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