Sunni radicals target Shiites to fan sectarian flames in Pakistan

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Pakistan Shiite Muslims offer prayers during a funeral for community members killed in an ambush in the northern town of Gilgit on Feb. 29.By Michael GeorgyReutersGILGIT, Pakistan -- About 20 men dressed as Pakistani soldiers boarded a bus bound for a Muslim festival outside this mountain town and checked the identification cards of the passengers. They singled out 19 Shiites, drew weapons and slaughtered them, most with a bullet to the head.

The shooters weren't soldiers. They were a hit squad linked to the Sunni Muslim extremist group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, or LeJ. They had trekked in along a high Himalayan pass that hot August morning to waylay a convoy of pilgrims.


Here and across Pakistan, violent Sunni radicals are on the march against the nation's Shiite minority.

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With a few hundred hard-core cadres, the highly secretive LeJ aims to trigger sectarian violence that would pave the way for a Sunni theocracy in U.S.-allied Pakistan, say Pakistan police and intelligence officials. Its immediate goal, they say, is to stoke the intense Sunni-Shiite violence that has pushed countries like Iraq close to civil war.

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