Three missionary priests murdered in Peru in 1991 have become the first Catholic martyrs to be beatified in the country.

According to Associated Press, around 30,000 gathered for the beatification ceremony of Polish priests Zbigniew Strzalkowski and Michael Tomaszek and Italian Alessandro Dordi on 5 December.

Fathers Strzalkowski, 32, and Tomaszek, 30, were in Peru to distribute aid on behalf of the Catholic Church. They were abducted in front of parishioners and murdered on August 9, 1991 after holding a mass in the district of Pariacoto.

Father Dordi was killed after celebrating mass three weeks later on August 25.

All three murders were undertaken by the Communist Party of Peru, more commonly known as the Shining Path. A brutal militant organisation, it is classified by the Peruvian government, the EU and the US as a terrorist organisation.

Shortly after the murders, an editorial in the Journal of the Shining Path accused the Polish priests of exploiting "religious faith of the people to strengthen the system of oppression in the country".