Mob use sledgehammers to damage minarets of Ahmadi place of worship in Pakistan

Mehmood told Dawn newspaper that “around 10 people initially attacked their hall at the time of Zuhr prayer…The security guard on duty fired into the air to disperse them. They fled but later a mob showed up and started chanting slogans against the Ahmadi community”. He claimed some of the worshippers inside the hall were also roughed up by the mob.

Mehmood said the same worship hall had been vandalised on February 3, and although five suspects were initially arrested, the police later released them.

“By not pursuing these cases against the culprits, the law enforcers and the government are, in a way, encouraging them to continue targeting our community halls in Karachi and other parts of the country,” he said.

Ahmadis are usually referred to as Qadianis in Pakistan, which is considered a derogatory term for them.

Pakistan’s Parliament in 1974 declared the Ahmadi community as non-Muslims. A decade later, they were banned from calling themselves Muslims. They are banned from preaching and from travelling to Saudi Arabia for pilgrimage.

Although the number of Ahmadis in Pakistan is around a million, unofficial figures put their population much higher.

In Pakistan, around 10 million out of the 220 million population are non-Muslims. The minorities in conservative Muslim-majority Pakistan often complain of harassment by the extremists. Earlier on July 25, an Ahmadi place of worship was vandalised in Karachi’s Drigh Road area.