PESHAWAR: Angry Pakistani Christians on Monday denounced the deadliest attack ever in this country against members of their faith as the death toll from the church bombings the day before climbed to 85.
A pair of suicide bombers blew themselves up amid hundreds of worshippers outside a historic church in northwestern Pakistan on Sunday. The attack on the All Saints Church in the city of Peshawar, which also wounded over 140 people, occurred as worshippers were leaving after service to get a free meal of rice offered on the front lawn.
A wing of the Pakistani Taleban quickly claimed responsibility for the bombings, saying they would continue to target non-Muslims until the US stops drone attacks in the remote tribal region of Pakistan.
The bombings raised new questions about the Pakistani government’s push to strike a peace deal with the militants to end a decade-long insurgency that has killed thousands of people.
“What dialogue are we talking about? Peace with those who are killing innocent people,” asked the head of the All Pakistan Minorities Alliance, Paul Bhatti, whose brother, a federal minister, was gunned down by an extremist in 2011.
“They don’t want dialogue,” said Bhatti. “They don’t want peace.”
The death toll on Monday climbed to 85, after seven more of the wounded in Peshawar died overnight and Monday, according to the commissioner of Peshawar, Sahibzada Anees.
“Our state and our intelligence agencies are so weak that anybody can kill anyone anytime. It is a shame,” said Bhatti.
Angry Christians blocked roads around the country to protest the bombings. On one of the main roads coming into the capital of Islamabad, demonstrators burned tires and demanded government protection for the members of the Christian minority.
“Our people have been killed ... Nobody seems to bother about us. No one apprehended the killers,” said Aqeel Masih, one of the protesters. He added that he fears Pakistanis will simply forget about the bloodshed in a few days.
In the southern port city of Karachi, a few hundred demonstrators chanted “Stop killing Christians!” and demanded that those who attacked their community be held accountable.
“We want an end to extremism, terrorism and barbarianism in Pakistan,” said Bashir John, a priest.
Missionary schools around the country would be closed for three days, said Christian leader Nasir Gill. He said 68 bodies of Peshawar victims were buried Sunday and the rest would be buried today.
Churches and other places important to the Christian community in Peshawar have been given extra security, said police official Noor Khan.
But this has not been sufficient to appease angry Christians in Pakistan, who want the government to take even stronger steps to protect them.
Many churches, as well as mosques and other religious institutions, already receive some type of police protection although many Christians say that is too little. A police officer who was supposed to be protecting the church where the suicide bombers attacked was killed.
Christians are a minority in Pakistan, where roughly 96 percent of the country’s 180 million people is Muslim.
Also Monday, a bomb exploded near a police patrol in southwestern Baluchistan province, killing four people, including three policemen, said police officer Abdullah Khan. The bombing occurred in Pashin district, some 70 km north of the provincial capital, Quetta, said Khan.
No one has claimed responsibility for the attack. Baluchistan is home to both militants and nationalists who have been fighting an insurgency against the government for decades for a greater share of the province’s natural resources.
![]()
Facing heat, Christians take to Pakistan streets
Facing heat, Christians take to Pakistan streets
Austria turns Hitler’s home into a police station
BRAUNAU AM INN: Turning the house where Adolf Hitler was born into a police station has raised mixed emotions in his Austrian hometown.
“It’s a double-edged sword,” said Sibylle Treiblmaier, outside the house in the town of Braunau am Inn on the border with Germany.
While it might discourage far-right extremists from gathering at the site, it could have “been used better or differently,” the 53-year-old office assistant told AFP.
The government wants to “neutralize” the site and passed a law in 2016 to take control of the dilapidated building from its private owner.
Austria — which was annexed by Hitler’s Germany in 1938 — has repeatedly been criticized in the past for not fully acknowledging its responsibility in the Holocaust.
The far-right Freedom Party, founded by former Nazis, is ahead in the polls after getting the most votes in a national election for the first time in 2024, though it failed to form a government.
Last year, two streets in Braunau am Inn commemorating Nazis were renamed after years of complaints by activists.
- ‘Problematic’ -
The house where Hitler was born on April 20, 1889, and lived for a short period of his early life, is right in the center of town on a narrow shop-lined street.
A memorial stone in front reads: “For Peace, Freedom and Democracy. Never Again Fascism. Millions of Dead Warn.”
When AFP visited this week, workers were putting the finishing touches to the renovated facade.
Officers are scheduled to move in during “the second quarter of 2026,” the interior ministry said.
But for author Ludwig Laher, a member of the Mauthausen Committee Austria that represents Holocaust victims, “a police station is problematic, as the police... are obliged, in every political system, to protect what the state wants.”
An earlier idea to turn the house into a place where people would come together to discuss peace-building had “received a lot of support,” he told AFP.
Jasmin Stadler, a 34-year-old shop owner and Braunau native, said it would have been interesting to put Hitler’s birth in the house in a “historic context,” explaining more about the house.
She also slammed the 20-million-euro ($24-million) cost of the rebuild.
- ‘Bit of calm’ -
But others are in favor of the redesign of the house, which many years ago was rented by the interior ministry and housed a center for people with disabilities before it fell into disrepair.
Wolfgang Leithner, a 57-year-old electrical engineer, said turning it into a police station would “hopefully bring a bit of calm,” avoiding it becoming a shrine for far-right extremists.
“It makes sense to use the building and give it to the police, to the public authorities,” he said.
The office of Braunau’s conservative mayor declined an AFP request for comment.
Throughout Austria, debate on how to address the country’s Holocaust history has repeatedly flared.
Some 65,000 Austrian Jews were killed and 130,000 forced into exile during Nazi rule.
“It’s a double-edged sword,” said Sibylle Treiblmaier, outside the house in the town of Braunau am Inn on the border with Germany.
While it might discourage far-right extremists from gathering at the site, it could have “been used better or differently,” the 53-year-old office assistant told AFP.
The government wants to “neutralize” the site and passed a law in 2016 to take control of the dilapidated building from its private owner.
Austria — which was annexed by Hitler’s Germany in 1938 — has repeatedly been criticized in the past for not fully acknowledging its responsibility in the Holocaust.
The far-right Freedom Party, founded by former Nazis, is ahead in the polls after getting the most votes in a national election for the first time in 2024, though it failed to form a government.
Last year, two streets in Braunau am Inn commemorating Nazis were renamed after years of complaints by activists.
- ‘Problematic’ -
The house where Hitler was born on April 20, 1889, and lived for a short period of his early life, is right in the center of town on a narrow shop-lined street.
A memorial stone in front reads: “For Peace, Freedom and Democracy. Never Again Fascism. Millions of Dead Warn.”
When AFP visited this week, workers were putting the finishing touches to the renovated facade.
Officers are scheduled to move in during “the second quarter of 2026,” the interior ministry said.
But for author Ludwig Laher, a member of the Mauthausen Committee Austria that represents Holocaust victims, “a police station is problematic, as the police... are obliged, in every political system, to protect what the state wants.”
An earlier idea to turn the house into a place where people would come together to discuss peace-building had “received a lot of support,” he told AFP.
Jasmin Stadler, a 34-year-old shop owner and Braunau native, said it would have been interesting to put Hitler’s birth in the house in a “historic context,” explaining more about the house.
She also slammed the 20-million-euro ($24-million) cost of the rebuild.
- ‘Bit of calm’ -
But others are in favor of the redesign of the house, which many years ago was rented by the interior ministry and housed a center for people with disabilities before it fell into disrepair.
Wolfgang Leithner, a 57-year-old electrical engineer, said turning it into a police station would “hopefully bring a bit of calm,” avoiding it becoming a shrine for far-right extremists.
“It makes sense to use the building and give it to the police, to the public authorities,” he said.
The office of Braunau’s conservative mayor declined an AFP request for comment.
Throughout Austria, debate on how to address the country’s Holocaust history has repeatedly flared.
Some 65,000 Austrian Jews were killed and 130,000 forced into exile during Nazi rule.
Latest updates
Recommended
© 2026 SAUDI RESEARCH & PUBLISHING COMPANY, All Rights Reserved And subject to Terms of Use Agreement.