In an east Pakistani city, more than 100 people have been detained after tens of thousands of Muslims destroyed homes and set fire to churches.
The allegations that two Christian men had torn pages from the Quran were what started the violence in Jaranwala.
One day after the violence, on Thursday, the historic Salvation Army Church was still engulfed in flames.
The atmosphere is still tense, therefore barbed wire has been installed around the ruins.
Additionally, public gatherings have been prohibited for seven days in Jaranwala’s Faisalabad area.
The two men have been charged with blasphemy, which carries a death sentence in Pakistan, but they haven’t been detained despite being accused of destroying the Quran, the sacred book of Islam.
Even though no one has yet been executed in Pakistan for blasphemy, even the mere accusation can spark large-scale protests that culminate in lynchings and murders.
A man from Sri Lanka was slain and his body was burnt on fire two years ago after he was accused of blasphemy. Six persons were killed and over 60 homes were destroyed by a mob in Punjab’s Gorja area in 2009 after they were accused of disrespecting Islam.
In the nineteenth century, Pakistan took up the British blasphemy law. Islamabad enacted harsher punishments in the 1980s, including the death penalty for insulting Islam.
The majority of people in Pakistan are Muslims—about 96%. Other nations, such as Iran, Brunei, and Mauritania, also execute people for defaming a religion.
Since Pakistan made blasphemy a capital offence, there has been an increase in religious-motivated violence since it “bolsters violent behaviour,” according to Iftekharul Bashar, a researcher at the think tank RSIS who studies political and religious violence in South Asia.
According to Mr. Bashar, “widening economic disparities have caused Pakistani society to become more fragmented, which has resulted in an increase in violence against minority religious groups.”
“The emergence of vigilante and extremist factions within Pakistan, some of which exhibit significant financial backing, also contributed to this trouble trend,” he continued.
According to a local official who spoke to BBC Urdu, after news of the two men reportedly profaning the Quran, the holy book of Islam, went viral on social media early on Wednesday morning, officials began receiving calls about protests and fires.
Authorities reported that they discovered shredded pages of the holy book close to a Christian community that had blasphemous writing on them in red marker.
The reports went viral on social media and in the city, upsetting the Muslim population. Mobs attacked and pillaged Christian homeowners’ homes during the ensuing bloodshed.
The Christian’s belongings were dragged into the streets and burned on fire, according to the police, who spoke to the BBC.
Christian Yassir Bhatti, age 31, was one of many who had to leave their houses.
He told the AFP news agency, “They broke the windows and doors and took out refrigerators, sofas, chairs, and other household objects to pile them up in front of the Church to be burned.
“They were ruthless; they burned and desecrated Bibles as well.”
Social media videos show demonstrators demolishing Christian structures as it appears that cops are looking on.
The alleged blasphemy was denounced by Punjab province’s communications minister, Amir Mir, who also said that thousands of police officers had been dispatched to the scene and that dozens of people had been detained.
A government source told Reuters that the majority of the mob’s members were from the Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP), an Islamist political organisation. The TLP has denied being concerned.
Anwar ul-Haq Kakar, the acting prime minister, urged prompt prosecution of the violent offenders.
In the adjoining city of Lahore, Pakistani Bishop Azad Marshall expressed that the events had left the Christian community “deeply pained and distressed.”
“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 wrote in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter.