Ab American tourist killed by a tribe on a remote Indian island felt he was called by God to bring the gospel to the remote, indigenous people.
North Sentinel Island is off-bounds to visitors and home to the Sentinelese, who killed John Allen Chau after he was illegally ferried there by fishermen, officials said.
Chau, 26, was slain on North Sentinel Island, which is home to what is considered the last pre-Neolithic tribe in the world and typically out of bounds to visitors, said Dependra Pathak, the director general of police in Andaman and Nicobar.
“A murder case has been registered against unknown persons,” Pathak said, adding that the local fishermen suspected of illegally ferrying Chau to the 23-square-mile island had been arrested on separate charges.
Chau was killed by members of the Sentinelese community using bows and arrows, according to multiple media accounts.
A source with access to Chau’s notes who asked not to be named said Chau wrote that he was “doing this to establish the kingdom of Jesus on the island…Do not blame the natives if I am killed.”
In 2006, two fishermen who strayed onto the island were killed and their bodies never recovered. An Indian Coast Guard helicopter sent to retrieve the bodies was repelled by a volley of arrows from the community.
