Elderly Christian man dies of injuries in Pakistan
74-year-old Nazeer Masih Gill died in the Combined Military Hospital on the 3rd of June. The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan calls the incident a "calculated assault, manipulated through religious fervour to gain maximum leverage".
An agitated mob of Muslims attacked Nazeer, accusing him of burning pages of the Quran. They threw bricks and stones at the old man, beat him with sticks and kicked him whilst he was lying on the ground, bleeding. Even though the police intervened, Nazeer ended up with multiple skull fractures and critical blood clots in his brain. The mob also damaged the ambulance transporting Nazeer to the hospital.
Nazeer’s grieving son, Sultan Gill, confirmed: “Doctors there conducted two surgeries to save his life, but despite the removal of bone fragments from his brain, his condition remained precarious, and he couldn’t survive.”
Nazeer had worked for over 30 years in the United Arab Emirates and returned to Pakistan to start a shoe manufacturing business using his savings 25 years ago.
Sultan – a member of the Presbyterian church – and his family were forced to leave their home and find shelter in a government-safe house to avoid further violence from the Muslim mob. Sultan said: “We’ve been told that we cannot return to our house for some days, as it is not safe yet. However, the entire episode has been so traumatizing for all of us that I don’t think we will ever be able to resume our normal lives there. All our valuables and belongings were looted by the mob. They also burned some rooms of our house and damaged the infrastructure. Our business was flourishing, making some local Muslims jealous of our success. There have been multiple attempts to involve us in fake cases, which we faced bravely, but this time, they misused religion to persecute us.”
The tragedy triggers protests throughout Pakistan to denounce anti-Christian violence.
According to Church of Pakistan President Bishop Azad Marshall: “Today every single Pakistani should be weighed by grief, not only for the atrocities in a foreign land but right here. Yet again, hate has brought us to the place where we must ask questions. The question is not ‘Where will this stop?’ because beyond the devastation of homes and lives, beyond the brutal killing of a hard-working man, beyond the devastation of a community and the grief of a family, we have already come too far!”
Source: https://morningstarnews.org/
