(Rizwan Tabassum/AFP/Getty Images)
Wednesday, May 13 2015
The Aga Khan, the spiritual leader of Ismaili Muslims around the world, has expressed shock and sadness at a bus attack in Pakistan that targeted members of his minority community on Wednesday.
Six militants disguised in police uniforms stopped a bus in the port city of Karachi carrying about 60 Ismaili Muslims and started firing. Passengers were told to bow their heads before being shot. At least 45 were killed and 13 were wounded.
“This attack represents a senseless act of violence against a peaceful community. My thoughts and prayers are with the victims and the families of those killed and wounded in the attack,” the Aga Khan said in a statement.
The Aga Khan, an honorary Canadian citizen who delivered a speech to both houses of the Canadian parliament in February 2014 and appeared with Prime Minister Stephen Harper at the opening of the Aga Khan Museum later the same year in Toronto, went on to say that Ismailis are a peaceful global community living in harmony with other religious and ethnic groups.
The bus attack is the first time Ismaili Muslims have been targeted in Pakistan and is sure to send shockwaves through the global Ismaili community of 15-million people living in 25 countries, including a significant population that settled in Canada after being forced to leave Uganda in the 1970s.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif condemned the bus attack and ordered an investigation.
Pakistan is in the midst of a battle on several fronts: trying to defeat the Pakistan Taliban in the tribal areas of the northwest, restoring order to its violence-plagued commercial hub of Karachi, and stopping sectarian violence in which Sunni militant groups carry out deadly attacks against the country’s religious minorities.
Ismaili Muslims belong to the Shia branch of Islam. In Pakistan, Shia Muslims represent about 20 per cent of the population and have come under increasing attacks by Sunni militant groups that accuse them of being infidels.
Shia mosques have been bombed in recent months killing nearly 100 and in the country’s Balochistan province the Hazara Shia minority has faced a campaign of bombings that has killed hundreds in recent years and drawn the attention of global human rights groups.
The bus targeted on Tuesday was used to pick up members of the Ismaili community for work on a daily basis and would drop them off at the end of the working day.
“It was on its usual rounds when this attack happened. People were just getting on with their normal lives, out to earn a living,” said Ismaili community member Ayesha Aly.
Gunmen fled after firing indiscriminately at bus passengers using 9 mm pistols. An injured passenger reportedly managed to drive the bullet-riddled bus to a hospital. A splinter group of the Pakistan Taliban has claimed responsibility.
“These killed people were Ismaili and we consider them kafir (non-Muslim). We had four attackers. In the coming days we will attack Ismailis, [Shias] and Christians,” said Jundullah spokesman Ahmed Marwat.
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