Nigeria: June 27, 2004

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  Plateau State, in central Nigeria, has thousands of soldiers and police searching for illegal weapons. One such search party attracted a large crowd of angry villagers. The soldiers, thinking they were about to be attacked, opened fire and killed two civilians, and wounded several others. The Christian and Moslem gangs in Plateau state have refused to give up their weapons, even after the government offered a generous buy-back program ($1,515 for an automatic weapon, like an AK-47, and  and $189 for home made rifles.) The buy-back program ended on June 7th, with only a few weapons being turned in.