Christians murdered in Pakistan
Two Christians were killed in Pakistan during January, says a Barnabas Fund report. On 9 January, Simon Emmanuel was murdered by Islamic extremists, who reportedly mistook him for his brother Younis Tasadaq who had fled the country after having been accused of ‘blasphemy’ in 1998.
Younis returned to Pakistan to visit his family in 2007; and it is believed that Islamic radicals determined to assassinate him, mistakenly shooting his brother. So far police have refused to register the case, claiming that it was suicide.
On 19 January a young Pakistani Christian worker, Sajid William, was shot dead by Muslim extremists on his way home from work in Peshawar, the capital city of the North West Frontier Province. Sajid was married and had an 18-month-old daughter. In this province bordering Afghanistan the increasing power of the Taliban and the weakness of central government mean that Christians are exposed to murder, kidnapping and intimidation.
