The funeral has taken place for dozens of people who have died in clashes in central Nigeria. Amid fears several hundred people have been killed, acting President Goodluck Jonathan has sacked the country’s national security advisor.

Residents of Christian villages close to the city of Jos say Muslim herders attacked their homes on Sunday, opening fire to force them out before slashing them with machetes.

Some witnesses say the attack appeared to be a reprisal after unrest in January. “For many years people have been living together peacefully. We don’t know what happened,” one Dogo Nahawa resident, Dan Yamu, said at a burial ceremony.

Religious differences are not the only reason for the violence. Fierce competition for control of fertile farmlands between indigenous groups and settlers from the mainly Muslim north have repeatedly triggered unrest over the past decade.

Copyright © 2012 euronews