An angry Muslim mob viciously murdered and cremated a Christian couple for allegedly desecrating the Quran in Pakistan on Monday.
A police officer on the scene described the attack that took place in the town of Kot Radha Kishan, located around 40 miles away from the city of Lahore, according to the BBC.
“A mob attacked [Christians] after accusing them of desecration of the Quran and later burnt their bodies at a brick kiln where they worked,” he said. “Yesterday an incident of desecration of the Quran took place in the area and today the mob first beat the couple and later set their bodies on fire.”
The married couple was identified by their first names, Shama and Shehzad, according to reports.
Punjab Chief Minister, Shahbaz Sharif, has organized a three-member committee to track the investigation of the double murder and has also ordered authorities in the area to beef up security at Christian neighborhoods in the province, the Inquisitor reports. Full Story.
(CNSNews.com) – Pakistan’s blasphemy laws have become a “license to kill Christians,” a Christian leader in the country said after a Muslim mob — enraged by claims that a Qur’an had been desecrated — beat and burnt a pregnant mother and her husband to death Tuesday amid cries of “Allah hu Akbar” and “kill infidel Christians.”
The slaying of the couple, brick kiln laborers named as Shahzad and Shama, was the latest in a long series of atrocities carried out by zealous Muslims, often targeting Christians and other minorities accused of blasphemy.
Blasphemy is a capital offense in the world’s second biggest Islamic country – a country which the U.S. State Department has for the past 12 years refused to blacklist for egregious persecution under U.S. religious freedom laws, despite recommendations by a statutory watchdog.
Incited by announcements over mosque loudspeakers in nearby villages, hundreds of Muslims dragged Shahzad and Shama out of a room where they were being held against their will, beat them with clubs, and then burnt them alive in a brick kiln, according to eyewitness accounts given to the Legal Evangelical Association Development (LEAD), a non-profit advocacy group.
Other Christian laborers employed at the kiln in Punjab province fled in fear of their lives. Full Story.
Pray for the Christians of Pakistan and other Islamic countries!