Last Survivor of 1996 Tibhirine Monastery Massacre Laid to Rest in Morocco

The sole survivor of the carnage of the Algerian Trappist monastery of Tibhirine in 1996, Father Jean-Pierre Schumacher now rests in his adopted city. The local population paid a well-deserved tribute to the monk, describing him as a "discreet man", a "scholar" and of "great kindness".

According to Barlamane, the funeral lasted two hours. A moment of intense emotion during which about twenty people accompanied the funeral procession, alongside relatives and brothers in faith.

It should be remembered that Jean-Pierre Schumacher escaped the massacre that caused the death of seven Trappist monks from the Tibhirine monastery. They were kidnapped and murdered in 1996 during the civil war in Algeria, under circumstances that remained unclear. Apart from a claim by the Islamists of the Armed Islamic Group (GIA) in the midst of the civil war, nothing more has leaked out about what really happened that day.

In 2010, Jean-Pierre Schumacher came to settle in Morocco where he became the prior of a small community of Trappist monks of the Cistercian Order in the Moroccan Atlas. "He often said that his survival was a call from God to bear witness, which he did all his life," says Mr. Nourissat.