JARANWALA: Police had been guarding a Christian neighbourhood in Pakistan on Thursday, after a whole lot of Muslim males rampaged by means of its streets burning and ransacking church buildings and houses over accusations of blasphemy a day earlier.

The violence broke out in Jaranwala, on the outskirts of the commercial metropolis of Faisalabad, after allegations unfold that Christians had desecrated the Koran, forcing households to flee their properties.
On Thursday morning, a whole lot of police had been deployed within the space — together with exterior the primary Salvation Military Church that had been gutted by hearth, its partitions and window blackened.

The day earlier than, rioters had hammered the cross atop the church till it cut up aside, to cheers from crowds beneath.
“All the Christians have left their homes and taken refuge here and there,” Fayaz Masih Khokhar, a Christian man who had travelled from close by Lahore, informed AFP.
“We are here to meet family members and also to show solidarity with our community. They burnt our churches, our Bibles, attacked houses.”
A minimum of 4 church buildings and 7 homes had been attacked, a police official informed AFP on the scene.
A spokesperson for the Punjab provincial authorities mentioned greater than 100 individuals have been arrested, with police additionally looking for to arrest the individuals accused of defiling the Muslim holy guide.
Photographs on social media confirmed crowds of a whole lot armed with sticks and rocks storming by means of the streets, with smoke rising from the badly broken church buildings.
Yasir Bhatti, a 31-year-old Christian, fled his house in a slender alley subsequent to one of many church buildings that was ransacked by the mob.
“They broke the windows, doors and took out fridges, sofas, chairs and other household items to pile them up in front of the church to be burnt. They were ruthless,” he informed AFP by telephone on Wednesday.
The boundary partitions of a Christian cemetery had been additionally vandalised, police mentioned.
Native Muslim leaders used mosque loudspeakers to induce their followers to show, in accordance with movies posted on social media.
“Christians have desecrated the Holy Koran. All the clerics, all the Muslims should unite and gather in front of the mosque. Better to die if you don’t care about Islam,” one cleric is heard saying.
Blasphemy is a delicate situation in Muslim-majority Pakistan, the place anybody deemed to have insulted Islam or Islamic figures can face the loss of life penalty.
Pakistani bishop Azad Marshall, within the neighbouring metropolis of Lahore, mentioned the Christian neighborhood was “deeply pained and distressed” by the occasions.
“We cry out for justice and action from law enforcement and those who dispense justice and the safety of all citizens to intervene immediately and assure us that our lives are valuable in our own homeland,” he posted on X, previously often known as Twitter.
Christians, who make up round two p.c of the inhabitants, occupy one of many lowest rungs in Pakistani society and are continuously focused with spurious blasphemy allegations that can be utilized to settle private vendettas.
Islamist right-wing leaders and political events throughout Pakistan continuously rally across the situation.
Politicians have been assassinated, legal professionals murdered and college students lynched over accusations of blasphemy.
“The frequency and scale of such attacks — which are systematic, violent and often uncontainable — appear to have increased in recent years,” the Human Rights Fee of Pakistan mentioned on Wednesday.
“Not only has the state failed to protect its religious minorities, but it has also allowed the far right to permeate and fester within society and politics.”
In one among Pakistan’s most high-profile instances, Christian girl Asia Bibi was on the centre of a decade-long blasphemy row, which ultimately noticed her loss of life sentence overturned and ended along with her fleeing the nation.
Her case sparked violent demonstrations and high-profile assassinations whereas spotlighting non secular extremism throughout large sections of Pakistani society.
Washington on Wednesday voiced alarm on the newest assaults and urged Pakistan to launch an investigation.
US State Division spokesman Vedant Patel mentioned that whereas the US backed free expression, “violence or the threat of violence is never an acceptable form of expression”.
Pakistan’s newly appointed caretaker Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar mentioned on X that “stern action would be taken against those who violate law and target minorities”.