Pope Francis has expressed his “great distress and sadness” at the massacre of 30 Ethiopian Orthodox Christians.
In a message to Patriarch Matthias of the Ethiopian Tewahedo Orthodox Church, he condemned “the continuing martyrdom being so cruelly inflicted on Christians in Africa, the Middle East and some parts of Asia”.
He said the men, whose deaths were filmed and shown in a video released by Islamic State terrorists on Sunday, were “killed for the sole reason that they are followers of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ”.
Ethiopia declared a three-day period of mourning for the men, who are thought to be migrant workers captured in Libya, similarly to the Egyptian Copts beheaded by IS members in February.
The Ethiopian Government, which is studying the footage, confirmed on Tuesday the victims were Ethiopian Orthodox Christians and said it was ready to repatriate any and all Ethiopians in Libya.
Patriarch Matthias said the killings were an act committed by terrorists and did not represent any religious institution or faith. He urged Ethiopians against seeking work abroad, in “countries that do not guarantee their safety, religion and property”.
The Ethiopian Muslim Affairs Supreme Council condemned the slayings as “genocidal acts”.
The footage appears to depicting the beheading of 15 men by masked IS terrorists on a strip of beach, and masked gunmen in a desert landscape shooting dead another 15 by firing to the back of the head.
A subtitle refers to both groups as "worshippers of the Cross belonging to the hostile Ethiopian Church".
The two groups of aggressors shown in the 29-minute video, titled Until There Came to Them Clear Evidence, are thought to be affiliates in eastern Libya and in the south.
The footage, which bears the official logo of the IS media arm Al-Furqan, is not dated.
In the video, a cleric introduced as Abu Malik Anas An-Nashwan presents religious justification for the targeting of Christians, saying their slaughter is permitted if they refuse to convert to Islam or decline to pay the protection tax known as jizya in areas controlled by IS.
“To the nation of the Cross, we’re back again,” says a masked militant in the video before the execution.
The video also shows IS jihadists destroying churches, crosses and paintings depicting the Virgin Mary.
Many Ethiopian Christians are part of the Coptic Orthodox Church, and travel to North Africa to seek work or en route to Europe.
In February IS released a video that showed the beheading of 21 Egyptian Copts on the shores of the Mediterranean in Libya.
Bishop Angaelos, the General Bishop of the Coptic Orthodox Church in the United Kingdom, expressed his “deep sadness” at “these executions that unnecessarily and unjustifiably claim the lives of innocent people, wholly undeserving of this brutality”. He added: “It is … our duty to ourselves, the world, and even those who see themselves as our enemies, to forgive and pray for the perpetrators of this and similar crimes.”
The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales expressed “deep sadness and grief” at the slayings.
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