Pretoria, March 13, 2024: Three Egyptian Coptic monks have been “brutally killed” inside a monastery in South Africa, the Church has said.
“Three monks were subjected to a criminal assault inside our Coptic monastery,” a spokesman for the Coptic Orthodox Church said in statement posted on Facebook on March 11, without elaborating.
South African police said they were investigating the triple murder.
The three were killed at the Sts Mark and Samuel the Confessor monastery located in Cullinan, a town 30 km east of Pretoria the capital of South Africa.
The victims were identified as Fathers Takla Moussa, Minah ava Marcus and Youstos ava Marcus.
An Egyptian member of the Church has been arrested as a possible suspect.
The murder has sent shockwaves throughout the Coptic Orthodox community in South Africa and beyond.
All three victims were found with stab wounds while a fourth who survived alleged that he was hit by an iron rod before fleeing and hiding, said police spokesperson Colonel Dimakatso Nevhuhulwi in a statement.
“The motive (for the) murders is unknown at this stage,” he said, adding that the suspects “reportedly left the scene without taking any valuable item(s)”.
South Africa has one of the highest murder rates in the world, and armed robbery is common.
One of the three monks killed was a representative of the Coptic Diocese of South Africa, said the church statement.
An internal investigation has been launched, it added, and the Egyptian ambassador to Johannesburg has been informed.
Archbishop Angaelos of the Coptic Orthodox Church in London described the murders as “saddening and shocking.”
Monks in the Coptic Orthodox Church, one of the world’s oldest churches, devote their lives to prayer and spiritual growth.
Agencies