Mosque attack victim hailed as hero

Community leaders today hailed one of the victims of a massacre at a local Shiite mosque as a hero, saying he barred the doors to the house of worship as gunmen closed in, saving many of those inside.

The man died shortly afterward of his wounds.

Gunmen opened fire outside the Imam Bargha Mehdi in the southern city of Karachi just after the call to evening prayers yesterday.

Nine people died and nine others were wounded in the attack.

Many of the victims had been watching Pakistan’s World Cup cricket match at an adjoining restaurant and were heading toward the mosque’s interior when the gunmen burst on the scene, witnesses said.

Community leader Ahmed Ali said one victim, Mohammed Ali, managed to bar the doors to the mosque after being shot twice in the jaw.

The 22-year-old Mohammed Ali succumbed to his injuries shortly after barring the doors, but not before saving many of the worshippers inside.

“Had Mohammed Ali not shown the courage to get into the mosque and bolt the doors from inside, there would have been many more casualties inside,” Ahmed Ali said.

Another man, also named Mohammed Ali, was injured in the attack but survived.

No group has claimed responsibility for the killings, but suspicion immediately fell on Sunni extremist groups which often target members of Pakistan’s Shiite minority.

Most of the deaths in the sectarian religious violence have been blamed on the Sunni extremist group Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan (SSP), which has been outlawed by the Government.

A breakaway faction of the SSP, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, also is blamed for attacks on Shiite Muslims, and several of its members have been arrested.

The rivalry between Sunnis and Shiites dates back to the seventh century. Most of Pakistan’s 140 million people are Sunni Muslims who have no quarrel with their Shiite brethren.

Witnesses who saw yesterday’s attack said those who could not get back into the mosque fled back toward the adjoining restaurant, but the gunmen followed them and shot them down. The gunmen fled on motorcycles.

Shafi Mohammed, another community leader, said: “Most of those killed were just young boys. They were watching TV and when the call to prayer started they switched off the TV and moved to the mosque.

“After the shooting started, they rushed back to the restaurant but the gunmen followed and killed them there.”

Funerals for at least two of the nine people killed were being held today.

Many of the other victims had moved to Karachi from cities in northern Pakistan, and their bodies were being sent home for burial.

Meanwhile, authorities suspended a deputy police superintendent and another police official for failing to protect the mosque. The Government has ordered all places of worship protected because of years of religious violence in Pakistan.