Following a Christian family’s blasphemy accusation, hundreds of Muslim men went on the rampage in eastern Pakistan on Wednesday, torching four churches and damaging a cemetery, according to officials.
After the Christian family was charged with desecrating the Quran, the violence broke out in the city of Faisalabad.
“The police and the masses are engaged in a standoff. The masses are not giving up. Police and Rangers, a paramilitary group, have been dispatched to handle the situation, according to district administration official Ahad Noor, who spoke to AFP.
In Pakistan, a country with a majority of Muslims, blasphemy is a contentious topic because anyone found to have insulted Islam or Islamic icons can be put to death.
According to social media footage, local Muslim leaders urged their followers to protest using the mosque’s loudspeakers.
“The Holy Quran has been trampled upon by Christians. All Muslim leaders should come together and assemble in front of the mosque. If you don’t care about Islam, it’s better to die, a preacher is heard saying in a video.
In another, people applaud and chant for the suspected blasphemers to be punished as a cross is ripped from a church’s steeple.
Social media posts also featured images of throngs of people invading the largely Christian neighborhood of the city while armed with sticks and rocks, smoke rising from church structures, and burned-out furniture littering the streets.
Along with the local government building, a Christian cemetery was also vandalized as protesters pressed for action from the authorities.
Four churches had been set on fire, according to Rana Imran Jamil, a spokesman for the city’s 1122 rescue agency, who talked to AFP. No injuries were mentioned in the reports.
According to him, there was a stir when “locals shared pictures and videos of Quranic pages on fire.”
According to the district government office, at least four churches had been burned down.
According to a police report, two Christian men who have fled the region will face charges.
The neighboring city of Lahore’s bishop, a Pakistani named Azad Marshall, expressed that the Christian community was “deeply pained and distressed” by the happenings.
“We cry out for justice and action from law enforcement and those who dispense justice and the safety of all citizens to intervene immediately and reassure us that our lives are valuable in our own homeland,” he wrote in a post on the social networking site X, formerly known as Twitter.
The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan has expressed concern that the blasphemy laws in this South Asian nation are being weaponized against religious minorities and used to avenge personal grudges.
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