Authorities in Burkina Faso Apologize after Shooting Zambian Catholic Missionary

The source adds, “Soldiers fired several times at individuals whom they claimed posed a threat. Unfortunately, one of the shots hit Brother Moses, killing him. The military police have apologized in an official letter to our congregation and the family of the missionary brother.”

Moses Simukonde was born in Zambia’s Monze Catholic Diocese on June 28, 1988. 

He had been a missionary for six years and had previously served in Niger. 

Up to his death, the Zambian-born Missionary was working at the reception home for the White Fathers in Ouagadougou.

Simukonde’s death comes barely three months after the murder of Fr. Jacques Yaro Zerbo, a Malian-born Catholic Priest who, at the time of his killing, was serving in Burkina Faso’s Dédougou Diocese.

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Bishop Prosper Bonaventure Ky announced on January 3 with “deep sorrow” the death of Fr. Zerbo, adding that the late Catholic Priest was killed on January 2 “by unidentified armed men” in Soro, Northwestern Burkina Faso.

The killers of the Malian Catholic Priest also took his vehicle.

Agenzia Fides has reported that since 2015, Burkina Faso has been going through a phase of serious political instability due to the violence of jihadist groups present in several areas.

Insurgency, the information service of Propaganda Fide says, has caused at least 10,000 deaths and some two million displaced people. 

On March 30, a state of emergency was declared in eight regions of the country, which comprise 22 departments corresponding to nearly half of the national territory.