QUETTA, Pakistan: Two Christians were killed in a drive-by shooting outside a church in southwestern Pakistan Sunday, officials said. It was the second such attack on the minority community in the area this month.
Unidentified gunmen on motorbikes opened fire at a group of Christians outside a church in Quetta, capital of Balochistan province.
“Four men on two motorbikes opened indiscriminate fire, killing two people while injuring three others,” local police official Abdul Razzaq Cheema told AFP.
The attack happened in the Christian-majority Esa Nagri neighborhood of Quetta. Hundreds of people gathered later to protest the killings.
“Around 500” protesters blocked a road by placing the bodies of the two victims in the middle, said local official Javed Anwar Shawani.
“We are negotiating with them to make them disperse and bury” the victims, he added.
The shooting comes just weeks after four Christians were shot dead in the city, an attack claimed by the Daesh group.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the Sunday shooting. Islamist militants have claimed past attacks on religious minorities in the area.
In December last year, two suicide bombers blew themselves up at a Quetta church, which was packed with worshippers, killing nine people and wounding over a dozen.
Christians make up less than two percent of Muslim-majority Pakistan’s 200 million people, and have long faced discrimination and violence.
Two Christians killed in drive-by shooting outside a church in Pakistan
Two Christians killed in drive-by shooting outside a church in Pakistan
- Gunmen on board motorcycles fired indiscriminately at people gathered outside the church
- The attack was the second against Christians in the area this month
France to open consulate in Greenland in February
- The comments came on the day that Denmark’s top diplomat is to meet senior US officials at the White House for talks over Greenland
PARIS: France will open a consulate in Greenland on February 6, the foreign minister said Wednesday, calling the move a “political signal” over the strategic Danish territory, which US President Donald Trump has vowed to seize.
The comments came on the day that Denmark’s top diplomat is to meet senior US officials at the White House for talks over the future of vast, mineral-rich Arctic island.
Since returning to office nearly a year ago, Trump has repeatedly mused about taking over Greenland from longtime ally and European Union member Denmark.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot told French RTL broadcaster that the decision to open the consulate was taken last summer, when President Emmanuel Macron visited Greenland in a show of support.
“For my part, I went there at the end of August to plan the consulate, which will open on February 6,” he said.
“It’s a political signal that’s associated with a desire to be more present in Greenland, including in the scientific field.”
“Greenland does not want to be owned, governed... or integrated into the United States. Greenland has made the choice of Denmark, NATO, (European) Union,” he said.
Greenland’s leader has said that the island would choose to remain an autonomous territory of Denmark over the United States.
Trump has said the United States needs Greenland due to the threat of a takeover by Russia or China.
The two rival powers have both stepped up activity in the Arctic, where ice is melting due to climate change, but neither claims Greenland, where the United States has long had a military base.
