A dejected US President Barack Obama on Thursday strongly condemned the “senseless murders” of nine Americans by a white gunman inside a historic black church, saying such type of mass violence does not happen in other advanced countries.
Members at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in downtown Charleston, South Carolina, had gathered for a prayer meeting when gunfire erupted in the 19th century building, raising racial tensions in the country that has recently witnessed a spate of killings of unarmed black men by white police officers.