World News

Togo: a tension between the two communities

elégetett Korán és szőnyegek

The Togolese Christians are worried because since the 27 July five mosques were damaged in the country.

The disturbers were not identified yet. In four days, five religious places were impaired:

  • In the night of the 27th of July, still, unidentified people entered the mosques of Agoè Demakpoe (situated to the North-East from Lomé, the capital of Togo), and destroyed praying carpets, and some copies of the Quran.
  • In the night of the 30th of July, another mosque, in the centre of Agoè was damaged. They made a fire in front of the mosque and buried some copies of the Quran.
  • On the last Sunday, the 5th August, a mosque, in front of the military camp of FIR (rapid reaction force, French abbreviation), and another one in the same quarter were vandalised, too.
  • On Monday, the 6th of August, the mosque of Agoè suffered an attack.

The opposition between Christians and Muslims

These devastations can raise the tension between the Christian and Muslim communities.

A local Christian leader said:

“Now, we have to pray a lot, and we must be alerts, because, according to the imams, the purpose of these vandalisms was to make an opposition between Christians and Muslims.”

Togo doesn’t take part of the World Watch List of persecution of Christians of the Open Doors. But the paranoiac dictatorship and the Islamic extremism make the local Christians’ life more difficult.

Source, photo: Portes Ouvertes

Translator: Ildikó Ungvári

 

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