Gunmen in Pakistan have gunned down a Christian priest and wounded another as they drove home from Sunday Mass.
Father William Siraj, 75, died instantly after being hit several times during a spray of gunfire in a residential of the north-western city of Peshawar.
Fellow clergyman Naeem Patrick was treated in hospital for a gunshot wound to the hand.
No-one has yet claimed responsibility for the attack, though police have set up security checkpoints around the city while reviewing CCTV to locate the culprits, who fled on motorcycles.
Pakistan’s small Christian minority has been targeted a number of times by militant Islamists as well as in mob attacks in Muslim-majority villages.
While Muslims and Christians mostly co-exist peacefully throughout the country, this has been threatened by persistent extremism and accusations of blasphemy which carry some of the strongest penalties in the world.
Violence by extremists has risen further since the Taliban’s offshoot in Pakistan ended a ceasefire with the government last month.
A memorial service for Father Siraj will be held on Monday at Peshawar’s All Saint’s Church, where more than 70 worshippers and 100 were wounded in a bombing and shooting attack by militants in 2013.
A suicide attack targeting Easter celebrations at a playground in Lahore in March 2016 left 70 dead and more than 340 wounded.
Chief minister Mahmood Shah of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province condemned the attack, urging police to find the culprits as soon as possible.
Bishop Humphrey Peter also condemned the killing and said the attackers sought only to undermine relations between Pakistan’s faith groups.
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