Getty The church chief is lucky not to be hurt

FREE now and never miss the top politics stories again. SUBSCRIBE Invalid email Sign up fornow and never miss the top politics stories again. We will use your email address only for sending you newsletters. Please see our Privacy Notice for details of your data protection rights.

The attacker was trying to kill the head of the Syriac Orthodoc Church, Patriarch Ignatius Aphrem II. The jihadi was stopped at a security checkpoint outside a hall in Qamishli, a city in northeastern Syria. The bomber detonated his bomb when he was being questioned by Sutoro security officials, killing himself, three guards and wounding five others.

Getty The jihadi was stopped at a security checkpoint outside a hall in Qamishli

The attacker was trying to kill the head of the Syriac Orthodoc Church, Patriarch Ignatius Aphrem II

The church chief Patriarch Ignatius Aphrem II was not injured. The suicide bomber had targeted an event commemorating the massacre of Christians more than a century ago. Locals were gathered at a hall to commemorate the deaths of tens of thousands of Christians by the Ottoman army starting in 1915. One guard said: "The suicide attacker tried to enter the hall where people were gathered but was stopped by local security forces, and he detonated himself among them."

Getty A charity worker has said that violent attacks have become too common

Another guard said the attacker "detonated himself near our checkpoint after he couldn't reach his real target, Patriarch Ignatius." The episode was the fourth terrorist attack in Wusta, a Assyrian and Armenian neighbourhood in Qamishly. According to one campaign group, A Demand for Action (ADFA), such attacks are seen as a "way to force the remaining Christians in Qamishly, a city built by them, to flee." Following the attack, Patriarch Aphrem said: "I would like see Christians remaining here in their homeland of their ancestors.

Getty The Supreme Head of Universal Syriac Orthodox Church visited Russia