By Staff Reporter
CHINIOT: An armed attacker opened fire outside an Ahmadi community’s place of worship in the central Punjab district of Chiniot on Friday, wounding six security guards before being shot dead by police officers stationed nearby, according to local authorities and community representatives.
The assault occurred at Baitul Mehdi, a worship site in Chenab Nagar, also known as Rabwah, a town that serves as the headquarters for Pakistan’s Ahmadi community. Closed-circuit television footage captured the suspect approaching with a pistol and firing on the guards, who were volunteers from the community.
The guards managed to close the main gate of the worship place amid the gunfire, preventing the assailant from entering. Shortly after the shooting began, two policemen deployed on the opposite side of the road retaliated, killing the attacker on the spot. The injured guards were taken to a nearby hospital, where four were reported to be stable and two remained in critical condition. Police moved the attacker’s body to the morgue for identification and autopsy.
Chiniot’s district police officer, Abdullah Ahmad, said the gunman had arrived in a car along with another person and that an identification card was recovered from the vehicle. He added that one of the guards was in critical condition, while five were stable, and confirmed that police and the guards had returned fire.
Aamir Mahmood, a spokesman for the Ahmadi community, condemned the attack, saying that continuous hate speeches were being made against the community. He urged the state to take notice of such hateful rhetoric and take strict action against those responsible. He demanded effective measures to ensure the safety of Ahmadi community members.
Pakistan’s Ahmadis, declared non-Muslims by Parliament in 1974, have long faced discrimination and violence from hardline groups. The community, which numbers in the hundreds of thousands, has been targeted in bombings, shootings and mob attacks over the decades, often fueled by accusations of blasphemy or religious deviation.
The incident comes amid heightened international concern over the treatment of Ahmadis in Pakistan. In July, a group of independent United Nations experts expressed alarm over a reported upsurge in violence and discrimination against the community, including killings, arrests and attacks on places of worship.
The experts, who report to the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, urged Pakistani authorities to take immediate action to address the situation, citing a “broader atmosphere of hatred and discrimination” that fuels the violence. “We are alarmed by ongoing reports of violence and discrimination against the Ahmadiyya community in Pakistan,” the experts said. “We urge Pakistani authorities to take immediate action to address this situation. Urgent measures are necessary to respond to these violent attacks and the broader atmosphere of hatred and discrimination which feeds it.”
They noted that an alarming number of attacks on Ahmadi places of worship and cemeteries have been reported since the beginning of 2024, some of which have resulted in serious injury to worshippers. The experts also expressed concern regarding alleged arbitrary arrests and detentions of Ahmadi worshippers over their religious holiday period, to prevent or obstruct their participation in their religious practices. The violations are considered to reflect an atmosphere of widespread hostility towards Ahmadis in Pakistan.
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