Gunmen open fire on church - two dead and eight hurt in sick attack
GUNMEN opened fire on a group of church-goers in Pakistan today, leaving two dead and eight injured.
REUTERS
The sick attack in Quetta, Pakistan, comes amid an onslaught of violent persecution against the country’s Christian community.
Today’s attack saw worshippers targeted by a pair of assassins on a motorbike, police said.
Investigators said the group had just left the town’s Christian church when the men opened fire. They then sped away from the scene.
Eight worshippers were taken to hospital and two people were pronounced dead.
Television pictures showed members of Quetta's Christian community burning car and bicycle tyres while protesting the shooting.
GETTY
At the hospital, people screamed and cried as the two bodies were brought in on a stretcher covered with white sheets.
Baluchistan, a region bordering Iran as well as Afghanistan, is plagued by violence by Sunni Islamist sectarian groups linked to the Taliban, al Qaeda and Islamic State.
It also has an indigenous ethnic Baloch insurgency fighting the central government.
Islamic State has created a branch in Pakistan and Afghanistan in recent years mostly by recruiting among established militants. Its followers have claimed some of Pakistan's most deadly recent attacks.
EPA
It also has an indigenous ethnic Baloch insurgency fighting the central government.
Islamic State has created a branch in Pakistan and Afghanistan in recent years mostly by recruiting among established militants. Its followers have claimed some of Pakistan's most deadly recent attacks.
This month four members of a Christian family were gunned down in Quetta a day after Easter, in what police officials called a "targeted attack".
In December two suicide bombers stormed a packed church in southwestern Pakistan, killing at least 10 people and wounding up to 56. Islamic State claimed both attacks.
Rome's ancient Colosseum was lit in red for an evening in February in solidarity with persecuted Christians, particularly Asia Bibi, a Catholic woman who has been living on death row in Pakistan since 2010, when she was condemned for allegedly making derogatory remarks about Islam.