Ten leading aid agencies have called for a "surge" in the humanitarian effort to help ten million people at risk of acute hunger across the Sahel region of west and central Africa.

Although often portrayed as a religious conflict, the crisis in Nigeria's Central Plateau State is of a social and economic nature, the foreign minister has told church leaders.

The avowedly Christian governor of Nigeria's Plateau state, Jonah David Jang, says that “religion is used to cover up all conflicts, although other factors also exist”.

Nigeria's acting president, Goodluck Jonathan, a Christian, has been sworn in as the country's president following the death of his Muslim predecessor, Umaru Yar'Adua.