Muslim extremists ambushed and murdered a 33-year-old evangelist after he led multiple people, including several Muslims, to faith in Christ at an event in eastern Uganda, Morning Star News has reported.

After an evangelistic event in Kituuti town on Sept. 6, the assailants pulled evangelist Philip Bere from his bicycle and bashed him with a large rock until he was dead, eyewitnesses told Morning Star.

Mudenya Sirasi, an associate of Bere’s, was traveling with Bere when he was attacked. Sirasi fled to a nearby tunnel and hid. He said many people, including Muslim women and two young Muslim men, had received Christ after Bere preached that day.

“We heard people talking from both sides of the road at a nearby bush saying, ‘They are the ones who converted our members today—they are not supposed to live, but to be killed,’” Sirasi told Morning Star. “From nowhere, one man who was stationed in front of us grabbed our bicycle that we were riding on and hit Bere with a blunt object on his back.”

Sirasi said he jumped off the bike and fled, but the assailants grabbed Bere.

After the attackers left, Sirasi reported finding Bere’s bloodied body, then alerted authorities and fellow believers in the area.

The pastor of Bere’s church told the news outlet that officers at the local police station indicated they were searching for the killers, who had reportedly gone into hiding.

“Our evangelist was killed because his passion for preaching the Good News of Jesus Christ, especially to Muslims,” the pastor said.

Bere was well-known for preaching to Muslims in eastern Uganda, the report said.

It was the latest of many documented attacks on Ugandan Christians. One recent example followed a similar evangelistic event on Aug. 11, when Muslim extremists assaulted a preacher and 20 other Christians for teaching that Jesus was God incarnate. 

While Muslims make up only 12 percent of Uganda’s population, they are highly concentrated in eastern Uganda.

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