KAMPALA: A police official says an extremist group is responsible for killing two Uganda Muslim clerics days apart.

Ugandan police chief Maj. Gen. Kale Kayihura said on Tuesday the clerics had refused to cooperate with the Allied Democratic Forces, a Uganda extremist group based in Congo.

The clerics were separately shot dead by armed men who used motorbikes to run away after killing the victims.

Sheikh Abdu Kadir Muwaya, head of the Shia Muslim Community in Uganda, was killed on Dec. 23 at his home in Mayuge, about 74 miles east of Kampala.

Sheikh Mustafa Bahiiga, a Muslim scholar and the head of Tablig Muslim sect in Kampala district was assassinated Sunday night in the outskirts of Kampala.

In 2012, five clerics were assassinated and police also linked these killings to ADF.

Published in Dawn, December 31st, 2014