Obama pays tribute to Charleston pastor along with thousands
Charleston
Thousands of mourners gathered today in Charleston to honor a pastor who was among nine black people gunned down last week in his church by a white alleged supremacist in an attack that shocked America.
President Barack Obama was to give the eulogy for Clementa Pinckney, who was also a state senator in South Carolina, in a speech to be watched closely in a nation still reeling from a violent act meant to tear open its racial divide.
The city of Charleston has tried to come together after the killings, and 6,000 people gathered for the ceremony at a university arena a short distance from the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, the scene of the crime.
The young man charged with the murders, 21-year-old Dylann Roof, published a white supremacist manifesto before the attack, including pictures of him with the controversial Confederate flag, seen by many as a symbol of hate.
"He wanted to start a race war but he came to the wrong place," church Bishop John Richard Bryant told mourners, eliciting cheers.
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