Gunmen attack 2 mosques of minority sect in Pakistan; 39 dead, worshippers may be hostages

Attackers strike sect mosques in Pakistan; 39 dead

LAHORE, Pakistan — Suspected Islamist militants attacked two mosques packed with hundreds of people from a minority sect in eastern Pakistan on Friday, laying siege to one center in a standoff with police, officials and witnesses said. At least 39 people died.

The attackers were thought to be holding several worshippers as hostages. One gunman fired his rifle while positioned atop a minaret.

The assaults in Lahore against the Ahmadi community illustrated the threat minority religious groups face in Pakistan, a Muslim-majority nation whose longtime struggle with sectarianism has been exacerbated by the violent rise of the Sunni extremist Taliban and al-Qaida movements.

The Ahmadis have experienced years of state-sanctioned discrimination and occasional attacks by radical Sunni Muslims in Pakistan, but never before in such a large and coordinated fashion.

Ahmadis are reviled as heretics by mainstream Muslims for their belief that their sect’s founder was a savior foretold by the Quran. Muslim leaders have accused Ahmadis of defying the basic tenet of Islam that says Mohammed was the final prophet, but Ahmadis argue their leader was the savior rather than a prophet.

Under pressure from hard-liners, the Pakistani government in the 1970s declared the Ahmadis a non-Muslim minority. They are prohibited from calling themselves Muslims or engaging in Muslim practices such as reciting Islamic prayers.

The attacks Friday took place in the Model Town and Garhi Shuha neighborhoods of Lahore, Pakistan’s second-largest city and one of its politically and militarily most important.

The assault on the Model Town mosque was brief, and at least 20 people were killed, hospital official Rizwan Naseer said.

Several kilometers away at Garhi Shahu, the standoff dragged on for hours.

One attacker climbed atop the minaret of the mosque, firing an assault rifle and throwing hand grenades, TV footage showed. Outside the mosque, police traded bullets with the gunmen, an Associated Press reporter at the scene saw.

Inside, attackers were suspected of holding hostages, police officer Imtiaz Ahmad said.

Authorities retrieved 19 bodies from the Garhi Shahu mosque, Lahore’s deputy commissioner Sajjad Bhutta said.

Punjab province chief minister Shahbaz Sharif appealed for calm.

“We, our security forces will fight this menace till the end,” he said. “Attacks on places of worship is barbarianism. It is a shame to cause bloodshed in mosques.”

A U.S.-based Ahmadi spokesman said the sect abhors violence and was deeply concerned about the attacks. He estimated Pakistan, a country of 180 million, had around 4 million Ahmadis.

“We are a peaceful people and monitoring the situation and hoping and praying that the authorities are able to take all necessary action to bring the situation to normalcy with the least number of casualties,” Waseem Sayed said via e-mail.

Also Friday, a suspected U.S. missile strike killed 11 alleged militants and wounded three others in the Nazai Narai area of South Waziristan tribal region, two intelligence officials said.

The exact identities of the dead were not immediately clear, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to media on the record.

The U.S. does not publicly acknowledge the missile program. Pakistani publicly protests the strikes as violations of its sovereignty, but is widely believed to secretly aid the attacks on Taliban and al-Qaida targets.

Pakistan has staged military operations against Taliban militants in its tribal regions, which stretch along the Afghan border and have long had little government influence.

Army fighter planes destroyed at least 10 suspected militant hideouts and one dozen vehicles in the Orakzai tribal region on Friday, killing at least 80 insurgents, administration official Samiullah Khan said,

Information from the tribal areas is nearly impossible to verify independently, because the areas are remote, dangerous and entry to them is largely restricted.

In Pakistan’s southwest Baluchistan province Friday, gunmen on a motorcycle killed four police officers in Quetta city.

One of the slain officers had helped arrest militants from the banned Sunni extremist group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, senior police official Naveed Ahmed said. But Ahmed did not blame any group for the attack, saying the investigation was continuing.

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Associated Press Writers Hussain Afzal in Parachinar, Abdul Sattar in Quetta, and Munir Ahmed and Asif Shahzad in Islamabad contributed to this report.