Chinese daily blames Indian, Western media for exaggerating impact of Quetta abduction

State-run Global Times says South Korea missionaries misguided the couple into becoming preachers

A Chinese state-run newspaper blamed the Indian and Western media on Tuesday for exaggerating the impact of the abduction of two Chinese nationals in Quetta last month.

"Some Indian and Western media intend to exaggerate the impacts of the incident," the Global Times wrote in its editorial.

Lee Zing Yang, 24, and Meng Li Si, 26, were abducted in Jinnah Town of the provincial capital on May 24. Later, the Islamic State terrorist group claimed it had killed the abductees. However, the claim could not be verified as yet.

"They aim at badmouthing and disrupting China-Pakistan economic cooperation by linking the terror act caused by religious conflict to the political and economic cooperation between the two countries," the editorial read.

According to the paper, South Korea missionaries misguided the two Chinese nationals into preaching Christianity.



"Apart from recruiting young people in China, South Korean missionaries send teenagers to conduct missionary activities in Muslim countries," it said. "Compared to Chinese, more South Koreans have been killed abroad due to risky missionary activities in conservative regions," it maintained.

"The atrocity committed by the Islamic State is appalling," the editorial read. "But it cannot drive a wedge between China and Pakistan, nor will the construction of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) be disrupted."

On Monday, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan was told that the couple belonged to a group of Chinese people who had obtained a business visa for Pakistan but were engaged in "preaching".



However, instead of carrying out any business activity they went to Quetta where they were engaged in evangelical activities under the garb of learning Urdu from a Korean national, Juan Won Seo, who owns the ARK Info Tech Institute.

The minister said it was highly unfortunate that a misuse of the terms of business visa contributed to the unfortunate incident of the abduction. He directed secretary interior to investigate the matter and ensure that such misuse did not occur in the future.

China has pledged to invest $57 billion in Pakistan in projects linked to its "One Belt One Road" infrastructure plan aimed at linking China with the Middle East and Europe.