PAKISTAN: Residents of capital say they feel more insecure after the Minister for Minority Affairs was gunned down in broad daylight

Record ID: 572690

  • Title: PAKISTAN: Residents of capital say they feel more insecure after the Minister for Minority Affairs was gunned down in broad daylight
  • Date: 4th March 2011
  • Summary: NEWSPAPER PHOTOGRAPHS OF BHATTI WITH HEADLINE READING, "SILENCED AGAIN" NEWSPAPER HEADLINE READING, "ANOTHER POLITICIAN FALLS PREY TO EXTREMISM"
  • Embargoed: 19th March 2011 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Pakistan, Pakistan
  • Country: Pakistan
  • Topics: Crime / Law Enforcement,Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVAMDF2S5OPPKMUD5MRGSFZPX78
  • Story Text: The mood was sombre on Thursday (March 3) in the locality of the Pakistani capital where a day earlier Taliban militants had killed the country's only Christian government minister.
    Security was tight on the street leading to the house where Minister for Minorities Shahbaz Bhatti -- who was killed in broad daylight in Islamabad on Wednesday (March 2) -- used to live with his mother and several siblings.
    Mourners, braving the frosty cold of a cloudy morning, trickled into the house.
    Someone had placed a small bouquet at the place where Bhatti had been killed as he left his house on his way to a cabinet meeting.
    Pakistani newspapers on Thursday warned Pakistan was being swept towards violent chaos by a growing wave of Islamist extremism that threatens to further destabilise the nuclear-armed U.S. ally where secular-minded politicians are imperiled by a rising strain of violent religious conservatism in the society.
    Residents in the capital blamed the government for the spiralling violence across the country.
    "The government is not taking any notice of all this. They do not care at all; they are only concerned with themselves. There is no security for the life or the property of anyone here," said bus conductor Taariq Mehmood as he scanned newspapers at a roadside stall.
    Bhatti is the second senior official to be assassinated this year for challenging the country's controversial blasphemy law, which sanctions the death penalty for insulting Islam or its Prophet Mohammad.
    Punjab provincial governor Salman Taseer was shot dead by his own bodyguard in January for calling for curbing abuses in the law.
    "You have seen that a minister was killed in broad daylight. This is not a small matter. The life of an ordinary person is not at all safe. If the unfortunate ministers are having to deal with things like this, what will become of poor people like us?" said salesman Amanat Ali.
    President Asif Ali Zardari told a party meeting on Wednesday (March 2) he would resist the slide towards extremism.
    Police said they had detained around 20 people for questioning while Interior Minister Rehman Malik told reporters that militants could target some more prominent figures.
    Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani announced a three-day official mourning and said country's flag would fly half-mast on Friday (March 4) to mourn Bhatti's death.
    Condemnation poured in from around the world after news of Bhatti's killing broke, with the Church of England and the Vatican decrying the violence against Christians in Pakistan.
    The funeral of Bhatti, a Catholic, is expected to take place on Friday or Saturday (March 5), his family friends said.
    Christians and other religious minorities have staged protests in several cities, denouncing his death and have called on the government to provide them protection.
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