Libya: Mass grave of Christians executed by ISIS found

Mass grave of 34 Ethiopian Christians executed by ISIS found in Libya

Libyan authorities have announced that a mass grave containing the remains of 34 Christians murdered by the Islamic State in 2015 has been found.

The interior ministry’s Criminal Investigation Department revealed that the bodies of 34 Ethiopian Christians were found on what drone images show is a farm near the coastal city of Sirte, according to Reuters.

Sirte was controlled by the Islamic State’s Libyan offshoot in 2015 but the terror group was later pushed out of the city by United Nations-backed forces in 2016.


In April 2015, however, the Islamic State released a video showing two groups of Ethiopian Christians in Orange jumpsuits being killed on a Libyan beach. One group was shot to death while the others were beheaded.

The murdered Christians were in Libya looking for jobs as migrant workers.
In the 30-minute video, the Islamic State warned the “nation of the cross” that more killings were to come in revenge for the “shed [of] Muslim blood.”

The Libyan government said that the discovered bodies will be repatriated to Ethiopia after “domestic and international legal procedures are completed.”

A video released showing the killings of the Ethiopian Christians led to tens of thousands of Ethiopians attending a rally in the capital of Addis Ababa to condemn the Islamic State’s violence.