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Three Italian nuns were found murdered over the weekend in the north of Burundi's capital, officials and a priest in the African state said on Monday.
Police said two suspects had been detained for questioning. A statement put out by the nuns' order said "the murders appeared to be the tragic outcome of an armed robbery or a vendetta".
Fr Mario Pulicini, responsible for the parish in Kamenge, a northern suburb of Bujumbura, named the nuns as Lucia Pulici, who was 75 and due to celebrate her birthday on Monday, and Olga Raschietti, 82. He said they were found dead in their dormitory on Sunday.
The third nun, 79-year-old Bernadetta Boggian, was found early on Monday morning, Pulicini told Reuters, adding that the killings appeared to have happened at two separate times. Boggian's body was discovered by the priest, who had rushed to the convent after a panicked phone call from other nuns who had heard unusual noises in the house.
"It is very difficult to know the reason behind the killing, but nothing can justify it," Pulicini said.
Italy's foreign ministry also reported the three murders.
The Vatican said the killings had "greatly saddened" Pope Francis. Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Vatican secretary of state, said in a telegram sent on the pope's behalf: "Pope Francis has learned with great sadness of the murder of three nuns."
The pope offered condolences on the "tragic death" of the nuns to their families, the local parishioners and the sisters' order, the Xaverian Missionary Sisters of Mary.
The Catholic diocese in Parma, Italy, where the order has its headquarters, said on its website that the death of Pulici and Raschietti appeared to have been "the tragic outcome of an armed robbery by a mentally unbalanced person".
The three nuns had served in Burundi for seven years, after working several years in the east of another central African state, the Democratic Republic of Congo. Raschietti had spent the last 50 years of her life in Africa. Pulici and Raschietti had helped look after sick people, the order said, while Boggian worked in a sewing school they had set up for girls.
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