Nigeria, Nov. 9 -- Data cited by US government officials to claim a Christian genocide in Nigeria cannot be independently verified, a BBC investigation has shown.

The report, published last Thursday, showed that much of the data used in the US political discourse to justify the threat of military action against the West African country is questionable.

According to the paper, while the figures for Christian deaths cited by some US officials were alarming, "assessing their accuracy is hard."

Most of the data comes from a Nigerian rights group, the International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law (Intersociety), which alleged that over 100,000 Christians have been killed and around 19,000 churches destroyed since 2009.

US Senat...