LAHORE: Christians staged a protest on Wednesday against the killing of eight of their community members by a Muslim mob, with some demonstrators smashing the windows of public buses.Television footage showed dozens of protesters in Lahore climbing onto vehicles and breaking their windows.Pakistan Christian Labour Party Chairman Ijaz Sindhu said some young people who broke away from the main crowd attacked four buses but caused no injuries to fleeing passengers.
A private TV channel reported that Christians staged a violent protest in Youhanabad. The demonstrators demanded the early arrest of those involved in the Gojra carnage. The channel said angry protesters, armed with sticks, gathered on Ferozepur Road and blocked the main road by burning tyres. The protesters chanted slogans against the government and pelted stones on the passing vehicles. Police were eventually able to pacify the protestors and disperse them from the scene.
Hundreds of Muslims attacked a Christian neighbourhood in Gojra city on Saturday after reports that a holy Quran had been desecrated.Eight Christians were killed. Authorities say an initial probe debunked the claims that theMuslim holy book was defiled, and government officials have said members of the banned Sunni group Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan and its Al Qaeda-linked offshoot Lashkar-e-Jhangvi was arrested as suspects in the attacks. The independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) said its fact-finding team has determined that the rioting had been planned and was not spontaneous. It said hard-line clerics made incendiary speeches.Christians - including both Protestants and Catholics - make up less than five percent of Pakistan’s 175 million people, according to the CIA World Factbook. ap/daily times monitor
(Daily Times)
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