Pakistani Minister Assassinated

Pakistan's minister for religious minorities was gunned down today in the country's capital, AP reports. Shahbaz Bhatti, himself a member of the country's Christian minority, had been threatened by Islamic militants in the past for calling for reforms of the country's strict blasphemy laws, which impose the death penalty for insulting Islam. The governor of Punjab province was killed earlier this year by a bodyguard angered at his opposition to the same laws. (More Pakistan stories.)