Minority rights: Silence, increasing intolerance make for another grim year

Pakistan

Minority rights: Silence, increasing intolerance make for another grim year

By Ali Usman
Published: December 29, 2011

Minority communities, activists suffered huge setbacks in 2011, beginning with the deaths of Taseer and Bhatti. DESIGN: FAIZAN DAWOOD

LAHORE: Silence became the biggest atrocity against minorities in Pakistan this year. With the rise of the phenomenon of crushing the voice of minority advocates and increasing intolerance, 2011 remained a grim year for minorities in the country.

The year opened with the assassination of then Punjab governor Salmaan Taseer by his own security guard Mumtaz Qadri in Islamabad on January 4. Taseer was killed for speaking against the blasphemy law and raising a voice in favour of Aasia Bibi, a Christian woman sentenced to death on charges of blasphemy.

Minority rights activists believe that the incident was a huge setback as not only did they lose a supporter, but the PPP-led government also distanced itself from those who supported amendments in the blasphemy law.

What was equally tragic, if not more, was the fact that Qadri was hailed as a hero by many. “The assassin of the governor who happened to be his guard was garlanded by a group of people. This raised many questions about the protection of minorities,” said Executive Council member of Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) Nadeem Anthony.

The second major setback followed closely, with the murder of late minister for minorities Shahbaz Bhatti on March 2 in Islamabad.

Bhatti also supported Aasia Bibi and had been playing a role in bringing amendments to the blasphemy law.

“The interior minister has said that the extremist group Sipah-e-Sahaba is behind his murder, yet they are still at large,” said Anthony.

Another tragic incident occurred in Mastung, Balochistan on September 20, when 29 people, mostly from the Hazara Shia community, were killed in two separate targeted incidents.

According to data gathered by The Express Tribune, from 1986 to 2011, at least 39 people booked under the blasphemy law have been killed before or during their trial. Of these, 18 were Christians, 16 were Muslims, two were Ahmadis, one was Hindu and two were unidentified.

Less killings, increasing Intolerance

“The situation of religious minorities in Pakistan progressively worsened,” stated the Working Group on Communities Vulnerable, established by the HRCP.

The group referred not only to violence against members of religious communities but also against the growing intolerance in society.

The group, in its report ‘Life at Risk’, noted that threats to religious minority communities have grown in direct proportion to a rise in militancy. “The factors for the rise in excesses against religious minority communities include not only the advance of militants and religious extremists but also the government’s failure to protect the basic human rights of these communities. No law can make anyone like a person, but if the law and the textbook label a citizen as inferior and another as superior, feelings of dislike increases,” the group maintained.

National Commission for Justice and Peace (NCJP) Executive Head Peter Jacob told The Express Tribune, “The number of discrimination cases against minorities in Pakistan in 2011 isn’t as much as it used to be in previous years; however the scale is larger this year. The phenomenon to silence the voices that speak for minorities is more dangerous and terrible and this is what happened this year”.

Positive steps for minorities

In 2011, several positive laws for minorities were also made. The Hindu Marriage Act has been submitted in the National Assembly and the government is considering making it a treasury bill, Jacob said.

The draft of Christian Marriage and Divorce Act has also been reviewed and is likely to be tabled in parliament.

“For the first time, four seats have been reserved in the Senate for minorities for which election will be held in March,” said Napoleon Qayyum, a Christian rights activist.

Way Forward

The working group further suggested that the quota reserved for minorities must be strictly observed. The group suggests that the lack of tolerance for religious minorities stems from textbooks, which should impart knowledge about all religions in Pakistan.

It suggests that all discriminatory laws against minorities should also be abolished and the National Commission for Minorities should be developed into a body that is independent and powerful.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 29th, 2011.

Copyrighted © 2011 The Express Tribune News Network
URL: http://tribune.com.pk/?p=313492

Pakistan’s blasphemy laws have left even judges in fear of their lives

Pakistan’s blasphemy laws have left even judges in fear of their lives

The furore over the killing of Punjab governor Salmaan Taseer for allegedly licentious behaviour is merely the latest and most extreme example of an appallingly divisive issue

Declan Walsh guardian.co.uk, Monday 3 October 2011 20.00 BST

Mumtaz Qadri, sentenced to death for killing Taseer
Photograph: STRINGER/PAKISTAN/REUTERS

So he’s going to swing — perhaps. On Saturday a Pakistani judge sentenced Mumtaz Qadri, the police bodyguard who assassinated the Punjab governor Salmaan Taseer, to death by hanging. The young policeman smiled and thanked God. “My dream has come true,” he reportedly said.

It was a predictably theatrical turn from Qadri, a former nobody who murdered Taseer in cowardly fashion – shooting the governor 27 times in the back – and who has since revelled in the notoriety of his blood-stained celebrity. Equally predictable, alas, was the reaction on the streets outside.

Close to the courtroom in Rawalpindi, angry young men attacked a monument to the former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, defacing her image on the spot where she died in a suicide bombing in 2007. Down in Lahore, turbaned men with long sticks surged through the ancient Anarkali bazaar, thrashing traders who refused to shutter their shops in sympathy for Qadri.

Meanwhile the clerics engineering the protests – old men with soft palms and tinder-dry beards – issued po-faced statements decrying the sentence. Qadri was a good Muslim, they insisted, and Taseer got what he deserved. The governor had offended them by advocating reforms to Pakistan’s antiquated blasphemy laws. In particularly they hated him for defending Aasia Bibi, a Christian mother-of-five sentenced to death under those laws last November. He deserved to die, they said.

Taseer’s wife and children, in contrast, were silent. They stayed at home, busy worrying about their son and sibling, Shahbaz. The 27-year-old was kidnapped in August as he purred through Lahore in a sports Mercedes – his father’s old car, in fact. Word has it he is being held in the tribal badlands of Waziristan; whether his captors are religious extremists, common criminals, or both, remains unclear.

The family is also reeling from character assaults. When Taseer was still alive, conservatives circulated photos of his children, lifted from their Facebook pages, showing them engaged in objectionable activity, such as dating and swimming in a swimming pool. After Taseer died, Qadri’s lawyers aired allegations about his sex life, drinking habits and apparent taste for pork – proof, they said, of a licentiousness that justified his cold-blooded murder.

The distasteful spectacle is partly a product of Pakistan’s social gulf. The Taseers inhabit the gilded bubble of a tiny elite whose westernised lives play out in Hello!-style photospreads of society magazines. In fact the Taseers own one of the most popular magazines. But it also goes to the heart of a bigger ideological crisis.

In theory, Pakistan is a country that welcomes all creeds and castes. But in practice it is proving to be anything but. Ask Faryal Bhatti, a teenage girl recently expelled from school for the crime of bad spelling.

A week ago last Thursday, the 13-year-old Christian girl was sitting an Urdu exam which involved a poem about the prophet Muhammad when she dropped a dot on the Urdu word naat (a devotional hymn to the prophet), accidentally turning it into lanaat, or damnation. Spotting the error, her teacher scolded her, beat her and reported the matter to the principal. The news soon flamed through her community in Havelian, 30 miles north of Islamabad.

Mullahs raged against Bhatti in their sermons; a school inquiry was hastily convened to examine the matter. Bhatti was expelled; her mother, a government nurse, was banished to another town, and the family has since fled Havelian in fear of their lives. All over a missing dot.

What accounts for such madness? In some parts Taseer’s death has inspired a McCarthyite atmosphere in which nobody wants to seen to be soft on blasphemy. But there is also a more profound reason. Devotion to the prophet Muhammad is central to the faith of the Barelvi Sunnis, who make up the majority of Pakistani Muslims. Even a whiff of insult to the prophet can whip up feverish anger.

The core problem, in fact, is that the blasphemy furore exposes the fragility of the Pakistani state – ideological, legal and security-wise. The mixing of religion and politics has long troubled Pakistan, but over the past 30 years that dangerous cocktail has been spiked by the army’s policy of nurturing extremists – hence men like Qadri who believe they have a right to kill in the name of God.

Meanwhile President Asif Ali Zardari’s government has shown zero leadership when it comes to reforming the blasphemy law – in fact, cowardly ministers have run a mile from any suggestion of change. And those who do dare to stand up for progress – or just the rule of law – live in fear of the next Qadri-style hit.

In truth, Taseer’s baby-faced killer is unlikely to be hanged any time soon. A lengthy appeals process is just starting, and the Zardari government has imposed an unofficial moratorium on capital punishment. But the judge who sentenced him, Pervez Ali Shah, faces perhaps shorter odds.

Judges who rule the “wrong” way on blasphemy face immense dangers in Pakistan. In 1997 extremists burst into the chambers of a high court judge who acquitted an accused blasphemer three years earlier, and shot him dead. Justice Shah will be fearing a repeat.

Reporters at Qadri’s hearing on Saturday noted that the judge slipped from the courtroom via the back door. He knows he is a marked man. Now only time will tell if the discredited Pakistani state can stand up for at least one good man.

© Guardian News and Media Limited 2011
URL: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/...blasphemy-laws

Critics Say Pakistan’s Blasphemy Law is Being Abused

News

Critics Say Pakistan’s Blasphemy Law is Being Abused

Peter Fedynsky | New York June 24, 2011

Alleged assassin of Punjab province governor, Mumtaz Qadri is taken into custody

In January, the governor of Pakistan’s Punjab province, Salman Taseer, was assassinated by his bodyguard, who claimed Taseer had violated the country’s blasphemy law. Taseer, a Muslim, was shot dead in broad daylight on January 4 in Islamabad. His alleged assassin, Mumtaz Qadri, has yet to be tried, though he does not deny pulling the trigger. The late governor’s daughter, Shehrbano Taseer, has become a critic of the blasphemy law, saying it is is often abused.

Asia Bibi, the Christian woman who Taseer sought to defend against charges of blasphemy, faces the death penalty - accused by women in her village of blaspheming the Prophet Mohammed.

Bibi protested her innocence in November.

“They [neighbors] filed fake charges against me,” she said. “In the past I have had conflicts with them due to a sewerage issue. They stole my goat.”

Shehrbano Taseer, the governor’s daughter, is on a speaking tour of the United States to discuss the issues surrounding the case. She says blasphemy laws are easily twisted to victimize Christians, Hindus and even Muslims, to serve the self-interest of the accusers.

“The ground reality is that they are mostly used as an instrument of oppression and terror. Anyone can level a blasphemy charge against anyone,” explained Taseer. “You know, it’s mostly due because of personal vendettas or land disputes.”

In the case of Asia Bibi, local clerics reportedly took the accusations against her at face value. One of them, Maqsood Ahmed Masoomi, insists that courts are not necessary to punish blasphemy.

“We are saying that anybody in this world who says anything blasphemous against the Holy Prophet has to be killed, and anyone who hears it [blasphemous words], should kill him on the spot. This is our belief,” the cleric said.

Taseer says Pakistani leaders fail to adequately pursue cases against those who abuse the blasphemy laws - partly because they fear being killed by extremists.

“This is not just this government, but previous governments have a tendency to appease these religious extremists, and there needs to be a no-holds-barred policy,” Taseer said. “They need precedents to be set to ensure that this kind of behavior will not be tolerated by the state.”

Taseer warns that in Pakistan, knives are being turned inward - by people who take the law into their own hands, hiding behind religion to pursue selfish ends. She says her father’s murder should serve as an occasion for the people of Pakistan to consider whether this is the kind of country they want.

URL: http://www.voanews.com/english/news/Some-Say-Pakistans...469.html

Climate of fear over Pakistan blasphemy laws

South Asia

28 April 2011 Last updated at 09:25 GMT

Climate of fear over Pakistan blasphemy laws

The scene of Shahbaz Bhatti’s murder is festooned with banners and flowers commemorating his life

Earlier this year two prominent politicians in Pakistan were murdered over their opposition to Pakistan’s controversial blasphemy laws. The BBC’s Jill McGivering investigates how the abuse of these laws is creating a climate of fear among Pakistan’s religious minorities.

One stretch of road in a residential suburb of Islamabad has the air of a shrine.

This is where Pakistani Minorities Minister Shahbaz Bhatti was shot dead in March. Bunches of flowers, many now dry and brown, are piled on the kerb. Large colour posters showing his picture are displayed alongside.

On seeing the media, guards from his mother’s home nearby rush out to explain what happened.

Mr Bhatti had just left her home, they say as they walk me through the short distance, when another car blocked his path at the junction and the gunmen inside it opened fire.

Mr Bhatti’s murder shocked Pakistan.

It came just weeks after the shooting of another prominent politician, Punjab Governor Salman Taseer.

Both men had dared to speak out about the need for debate and possible reform of the controversial blasphemy laws.

And both men paid with their lives.

Not long before his death, Mr Bhatti had a long phone conversation with one of his brothers, Paul, an affluent doctor based in Italy. I met Paul Bhatti in Shahbaz Bhatti’s old offices.

‘Victimised’

“We discussed his work and the threat to his life,” he told me. “I tried to persuade him to stop and move to Europe but he wouldn’t.”

Meher Aslam Nasir is pursuing a charge of blasphemy against some Ahmadi men

Now, as a result of his brother’s death, Paul Bhatti has decided to suspend his medical career, return to Pakistan and continue his brother’s fight.

“We need to change the laws,” he said, “and also change people’s thinking. Some people think we want to amend the laws so that people can commit blasphemy. Of course we don’t want that - why would anyone want to do that?

“But we do want to protect innocent people who are victimised by this law. Some people use it for personal revenge.”

The Bhatti family are Christians and particularly aware of false blasphemy charges made against religious minorities.

In terms of actual numbers, most cases are filed against Muslims - but groups like Christians and Ahmadis, a very small proportion of Pakistan’s population, account for a disproportionately high percentage of cases.

It’s not only Christians. It's also many Muslims who are suffering because of this”

Joseph Coutts
Roman Catholic Bishop of Faisalabad

The recent high-profile murders have certainly added to the climate of fear surrounding this highly sensitive issue.

As I travelled through Pakistan, speaking to people who are directly involved with current cases, either as accusers or accused, many were terrified.

Many of the accused, even those who had been acquitted by the courts, have been forced to abandon their homes and go into hiding.

A blasphemy conviction carries the death penalty although in practice it is not carried out in these cases.

But the accused, whether they are convicted or not, face a constant threat of being murdered.

Many Pakistani Muslims feel intense passion about their faith. Any suggestion that someone may have insulted the Prophet or defiled the Koran sparks anger which can sometimes turn to physical violence.

Conservative clerics oppose attempts to reform the laws. They also warn that if the courts are lenient, the public may increasingly choose to take the law into its own hands and execute its own form of extra-judicial justice.

In Nankana Sahib in Punjab Province, I met Meher Aslam Nasir, a lawyer and leading member of an Islamic political party. He is currently pursuing a charge of blasphemy against several Ahmadi men.

“As Muslims, how can we allow anyone to intentionally or unintentionally defame the Prophet and not bring them to justice? We must implement the law. Innocent people have never been targeted and never will be,” he said.

‘False accusations’

But others disagree. Joseph Coutts, the Catholic Bishop of Faisalabad, says his concern is not with the purpose of the laws but with the way he says they are being abused.

Christians argue they are often falsely accused of blasphemy

“Most cases are false accusations,” he told me, “to settle personal disputes or sometimes for land grabbing. Once you are accused, no-one stops to ask: excuse me, did you really say this? The emotions just boil over.

“And if it is announced from the mosque, everyone accepts it as true and they’re ready to attack the person. It’s not only Christians. It’s also many Muslims who are suffering because of this.”

There are concerns too about the difficulty of proving innocence. Allegations that someone verbally insulted the Prophet often come down to one person’s word against another’s.

Some suggest that one way of reducing false and malicious allegations would be to introduce stiff penalties for anyone who makes an allegation which fails to lead to a conviction.

In the meantime, one consequence of the recent bloodshed is that public debate has been stifled.

To critics of these laws, that is a severe blow to Pakistan’s weak democracy as it continues to battle against Islamic extremism.

Jill McGivering’s report Blasphemy: A Matter of Life and Death can be heard on the Assignment programme on the BBC World Service on Thursday 28 April.

BBC © 2011
URL: www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-13038060

Republic of Fear and Bigotry

OINION

Republic of Fear and Bigotry

By Nasim Zehra
Published: February 5, 2011

The writer is director current affairs at Dunya TV and a former fellow at Asia Center, Harvard University nasim.zehra@tribune.com.pk

Last week in our Senate, two revealing incidents took place. One, the refusal of a senator to lead the fateha for the assassinated Governor Salmaan Taseer. Second, a privilege motion moved by Senator Mandokhel, calling upon the deputy chairman of the Senate to declare a Pakistani woman a blasphemer because, in a text message, she had referred to the late governor as shaheed. Mandokhel sahib’s contention is that since Salmaan Taseer was a blasphemer, anyone calling him shaheed is also a blasphemer. On February 3, responding to the senator’s insistence that the chairman Senate give a ruling on the matter, the chairman said he would do so later. The Senate session was then prorogued.

In the last few weeks, new blasphemy cases have been filed, one of them against a first-year student. The 17-year-old, reported to the police for writing something blasphemous on his examination paper, is now in prison. Also, last week a sessions court handed down a death sentence, along with a Rs200,000 fine, to a man of Jalalpur Peerwala for committing blasphemy. The accused was reportedly mentally challenged.

Against the backdrop of these incidents, a factual review of the developments that took place after PPP MNA Sherry Rehman proposed the initial bill, alongside initial government moves to review Article 295, is essential. Of course, the current outcome of this move has been that the prime minister has announced the withdrawal of Ms Rehman’s bill.

The new aspect to the prime minister’s February 3 announcement was that he had consulted Ms Rehman and that she had agreed to withdraw her bill. Her statement, however, indicates that it was more or less a unilateral move by the prime minister but that she would abide by it because of party discipline. More importantly, as she explained, the withdrawal announcement was unnecessary since the bill had not even been tabled. What is truly ironic is that in the same statement in which the prime minister announced the withdrawal of the bill, he invited various political parties to come forward and discuss ways on how to prevent misuse of the existing law — which is precisely what Ms Rehman’s proposed amendment bill was seeking to address.

Meanwhile, of the many developments that took place after the sessions court’s judgment against Aasia Bibi, six are especially noteworthy.

The first is that while human rights groups have been working on the issue of misuse of the blasphemy law for years, it was when the PPP-led government announced a committee to amend the laws that Ms Rehman tabled her bill. She shared it with all party leaders and made it a point to inform the chief whip of the government of her plans — and he did not ask her to hold off for a while. She consulted with several lawyers about the bill and did not submit it in secret. The proposed amendment created a wave of awareness that has finally led everyone (including the Council of Islamic Ideology) to concede that changes are required to end the existing law’s misuse. Even the religious parties have taken this position of reform repeatedly in various forums. All this contradicts the claims of those who now hold the view that the introduction of this bill was an ill-timed move.

Two, the government blundered along, making contradictory moves and statements on the issue of amending the blasphemy law ever since Aasia Bibi’s conviction. They set up a committee to review it and created a parliamentary subcommittee headed by MNA Nafisa Shah. But at the first whiff of criticism by other groups, the law minister announced that the amendment will take place “over my dead body”.

On one hand, the Punjab governor, when he was alive, criticised the law and lobbied for Aasia’s presidential pardon while on the other, the same government’s law and interior ministers were saying quite the opposite. Instead of ironing out these stark contradictions, the departure of the JUI from the coalition convinced the government that backtracking on the amendment would buy it survival security. Hence, Sherry Rehman’s bill was not a victim of bad timing but, in fact, a victim of the PPP’s bad politics.

Three, every backtracking move by the government emboldened those who equated amendment of the man-made law with blasphemy. Parties like the PTI, the PML-N and the PML-Q have become actively engaged in street protests organised by the ‘religious right’ that are shadow-boxing with imaginary blasphemers.

Four, in pursuit of what the government believes to be survival-mode politics, the government and the PPP have practically abandoned Sherry Rehman. She has been provided some security outside her house but no government ministers have spoken in parliament against the death threats that she has been receiving. Almost no one has spoken for her at other public forums either. The government has not opted to be part of her defence in the Lahore High Court where there is a case demanding that she be disbarred from parliament. She is also involved, again unsupported by the PPP, in a blasphemy case in Multan.

Five, the big names of the legal community who led the lawyers’ movement seem to have opted for selective commitment to rule of law by not taking a clear-cut position to stand by Sherry Rehman — barring exceptions like Salman Akram Raja and Hina Jilani. Six, against the backdrop of increasing cases of blasphemy being registered — against a student, a doctor and a Dera Ghazi Khan imam and his son — Ms Rehman stands vindicated on both the call for amending the existing law and on the timing of such a proposed amendment.

The government’s blundering over amending Article 295 of the Pakistan Penal Code will qualify as a textbook example of how expedient politics can take nations down a path of disaster. Clearly, in the Senate, the chairman has found it difficult to give a ruling against Senator Mandokhel’s incredible demand that an activist be denounced as a blasphemer. Equally incredible is the imprisonment of a 17-year-old on blasphemy charges. And, not least of all, the news that no one is representing the prosecution in the court as the case of Governor Salmaan Taseer’s murder proceeds is shocking.

In the coming days, it is not unlikely that, led by the short-sighted politics of the PPP and of other parliamentary parties, Pakistan’s politics and state will have, in fact, weakened the best Islamic values within Pakistan, undermined parliamentary politics and strengthened the constituency of those who want to see Pakistan turn into the Republic of Fear and Bigotry.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 6th, 2011.

URL: http://tribune.com.pk/story/114564/republic-of-fear-and-bigotry/

Hand out blinkers for blasphemy law

Pakistan

Hand out blinkers for blasphemy law

By Khaled Ahmed
Published: February 4, 2011

The govt, opposition, clergy and even some journalists have behaved in a similar way with regards to blasphemy law.

The government has bitten the dust and can’t be blamed for it too much because all politicians in the opposition too have behaved the same way while the clergy upped the ante on blasphemy law.

The PPP lost its governor in Punjab at the hands of a religious fanatic which the police had ignored in its ranks; and its MNA Sherry Rehman has been made to take back her proposed legislation aimed at humanising the said law in Pakistan. The British Raj did much better on the subject after Muslims as a minority in India complained that their religion was increasingly coming under communal attack. In 1927, Article 295 was added to the Penal Code under which ‘deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings of any class by insulting its religious belief’ became a culpable offence. It suggested a maximum of ten months in jail as punishment and the law did very well in the field. There were only 10 blasphemy cases in the 58 years between 1927 and 1985. Since that year, the number of blasphemy cases has soared to more than 4,000.

Journalists are not free of the blot of intolerance: Chief Reporter The News Ansar Abbasi wrote in Jang (12 Jan 2011) that he and a number of conservative lawyers in Lahore got together to file a petition in 1984 at the Federal Shariat Court asking for a law against insult to the Prophet (PBUH). In July 1984, a lady lawyer (Asma Jahangir – KA) had insulted the Prophet (PBUH) in Islamabad during a speech. This was followed by unrest in the meeting:

‘On this Appa Nisar Fatima, [mother of PML-N leader Ahsan Iqbal who hailed from General Zia’s conservative district of Jalundhar in India] presented the bill about 295-C of the Penal Code. It was approved but Law Minister Iqbal Ahmad Khan changed the text at the last minute to assign “death or life” as punishment for blasphemy. Nisar Fatima took the matter back to Federal Shariat Court saying the punishment for blasphemy was a hadd and could not be less than death. Hearing started on first April 1987. Dr Tahirul Qadri held that evidence of intent was not required (sic!) before quickly killing the blasphemer. The Court gave the government till 1991 to amend the Section 295-C. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had to obey’.

Associate Professor and Head of Department of Law & Policy, Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS), Osama Siddique and BA Hons (Oxen) Zahra Hayat, have contributed a paper on blasphemy law which notes that determination of ‘intent’ was no longer a requirement before punishing accused blasphemers.: ‘The absence of an intent requirement in Sections 295-B, 295-C, and 298-A has made it possible for blasphemy charges that may otherwise have failed the mens rea test to spawn lengthy trials continuing to the appellate level’.

Was the ‘nass’ (clear edict) of death for blasphemy mentioned in the Holy Quran? Listen to a TV discussion here to find how Jamaat-e-Islami leader Fareed Paracha ‘proves’ this. He quotes Sura Ahzab verse number 56 saying: Allah and His angels send Darood on the Prophet (PBUH). Then he quotes verse 57 saying: whoever hurts the Prophet (PBUH) will go to Hell. But after that he omits verses 58, 59 and 60 and quotes verse 61 instead, which says: kill them wherever you find them. The verses he omitted actually talk about munafiqeen (hypocrites).

Not even his spiritual mentor Maulana Maududi in his monumental work of exegesis ‘Tafheem al-Quran’ interprets the above verses to mean that blasphemers had to be punished with death. Today, we cope with the humiliation that comes from having this law on our statute books because no one is prepared to think rationally.

The minorities – the poorest stratum of our society who had received assurances of equal treatment from the founder of the state, Quaid-e-am Muhammad Ali Jinnah – have to bear the brunt of this hatred of ourselves. When the world is outraged by what we do to women and the minorities here, we respond with xenophobia.

The politician, when not resting his head in a pile of sand, wears blinkers so that he can avoid facing up to the moral fallout from blasphemy law.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 4th, 2011.

URL: http://tribune.com.pk/story/113997/hand-out-blinkers-for-blasphemy-law/

Pakistan MP drops effort to repeal blasphemy laws

South Asia

3 February 2011 Last updated at 14:11 GMT

Pakistan MP drops effort to repeal blasphemy laws

Many in Pakistan are opposed to any effort to alter the blasphemy laws

A Pakistani politician has dropped her attempt to amend the country's controversial blasphemy laws, accusing her party of appeasing extremists.

Pakistan People's Party MP Sherry Rehman made her decision after the government ruled out changing the law.

Correspondents say Ms Rehman is one of only a few politicians prepared to speak out on the blasphemy law.

They say there has been a climate of fear since the murder of Punjab governor Salman Taseer who opposed it.

Mr Taseer was killed in January by one of his bodyguards, who later admitted murdering the governor because he had spoken out against the blasphemy law.

Hundreds of people are in prison on charges under the law. Critics say it has been used to persecute minority faiths and is sometimes exploited by people pursuing grudges against others.

It has been under scrutiny since a Christian, Asia Bibi, was sentenced to death in November. Ms Bibi denies insulting the Prophet Muhammad in her Punjab village in June 2009.

'Blow-back'

Ms Rehman told the BBC in January that she received death threats every half hour, but would defy them.

However, in a statement received by the BBC on Thursday, she said she would not be proceeding with her proposed bill following remarks by Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani earlier in the week.

"Since the PM announced that there cannot even be discussion on procedural amendments, and the committee announced by the party to amend the laws has been disbanded, then as a PPP representative I had no option but to abide by the party's decision in parliament.

She added: "Appeasement of extremism is a policy that will have its blow-back."

Mr Gilani had said that no amendment in the law could be considered. He also disbanded a committee set up to determine how to amend the laws.

The BBC's Syed Shoaib Hasan in Karachi says politicians in Pakistan are increasingly reluctant to amend the law - many are afraid of being targeted in the way Mr Taseer was.

He says Ms Rehman's courageous stance against what is seen by some experts as a flawed law has few public supporters.

Ms Rehman stressed that she had not agreed to "withdraw" her private member's bill.

"There was never any question of withdrawing the bill as the Speaker had never admitted it on the agenda," she said.

Ms Rehman added that if the Speaker had allowed her bill "perhaps some of our colleagues would have understood that it was not suggesting total repeal of the law, but protecting our great Prophet's name against injustices done via procedures introduced by [former President] Zia ul-Haq.

"It was a question of protecting our citizens from injustice done in the name of a religion that values peace and tolerance more than anything else," she said.

Her statement came as Human Rights Watch urged the government to release a boy of 17 who is under arrest in Pakistan, accused of blaspheming against the Prophet Muhammad in a high school exam.

BBC © MMXI
URL: www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-12355001

Extremist Intimidation Chills Pakistan Secular Society

Extremist Intimidation Chills Pakistan Secular Society

by Julie McCarthy

 Listen to the Story or Download. 07:46

Pakistani police guards carry the coffin of the assassinated governor of Punjab, Salman Taseer, during the funeral procession in Lahore on Jan. 5. - Arif Ali/AFP/Getty Images

January 24, 2011

In Pakistan, a battle has been joined by those who want a tolerant Islamic state against those who want a fundamentalist religious regime.

The killing in Pakistan earlier this month of Punjab Gov. Salman Taseer has cheered the religious right while chilling secular Pakistanis and exposing deep fissures in the society.

The governor was gunned down in Islamabad by a bodyguard angered at his bid to relax the country’s blasphemy laws. The assassination of Taseer, an audacious advocate for modernism, revealed the conservative attitudes about Islam that are sweeping through Pakistan.

A Growing Rift

A growing and dangerous dichotomy is evident in the Old City of Lahore that teems with shop owners and vendors. Outdoor stalls sit cheek by jowl in the city of 6 million.

In the aftermath of the governor’s killing, Zafar Iqbol, 65, who owns a fabric shop in the Mehood Cloth Market, says he “fears for the future.”

“We feel utterly helpless,” he says. “The market here is under the dominion of elements who have affiliations with religious parties. They come along and they insist that we shut things down, and of course we’re afraid not to, so we do close things down and we lose our business.”

A few of the men who run the market traders association hoist themselves onto the counter of Iqbol’s stall and lean in to listen, causing the owner obvious discomfort.

Members of the Association to Protect the Dignity of the Holy Prophet, or Tahafuz-e-Namwoos Risalat, join the Sunni Itehad Council in a protest march to denounce the Pope. The Vatican called for the abolition of Pakistan's blasphemy laws after a Christian woman accused of blaspheming the Prophet Muhammad was sentenced to death. - Julie McCarthy/NPR

While Iqbol mourns the loss of the governor, his unannounced visitors feel anything but sorrow. Mohammad Ilyas, the vice president of the traders association, says the slain governor maligned Islam when he said Pakistan’s strict laws on blasphemy had become a tool to oppress religious minorities.

“It was totally wrong on the part of the governor to say that the blasphemy laws of Pakistan should be changed. The governor not only criticized the law of the land, but he went out of his way to protect Asia Bibi,” a Christian woman who was sentenced to death last year on the charge of blaspheming the Prophet Muhammad.

When asked whether Taseer deserved to die, Ilyas, 65, says, “Definitely, because he interfered with the religion of this country. If he hadn’t interfered, he would not have been killed.”

Making An Assassin A Hero

Banners draped in the streets of the Punjab capital, Lahore, call the governor’s confessed killer, Mumtaz Qadri, a hero. The 23-year-old police commando assigned to guard the governor said Taseer was an apostate for opposing Pakistan’s blasphemy law.

Evidence that fundamentalism is becoming mainstream was found in the young lawyers who showered the assassin with rose petals as he entered court in Islamabad one day after the shooting. It signaled that religious fundamentalism was not the purview of the poor Pakistani masses but reaches far into the educated class as well.

Demonstrations saluting Qadri have continued throughout the country, a disturbing signal for Washington, which is hoping for greater stability from its nuclear armed ally.

Supreme Court Bar Association President Asma Jahangir says each time democracy begins to take hold in Pakistan, the extreme right wages an offensive that is more lethal than the one before.

“And there is a reason behind it. They do not want a democratic dispensation here. It doesn’t suit them. They don’t figure in there. They get marginalized there. So the murder of the governor was a part of that larger plan as well,” she says.

Parliamentarian Sherry Rehman also is facing death threats for proposing amendments to the blasphemy law, as had the governor. Rehman says “sane” voices have been silenced.

Historian Mubarak Ali estimates that the religious right now makes up some 30 percent of Pakistani society and says radical clerics have been emboldened by the mainstream parties, including President Asif Ali Zardari's Pakistan Peoples Party. - Julie McCarthy/NPR

“And none of them are seeking to offend sensibilities of any religion, let alone Muslims themselves,” she says.

Rehman’s Pakistan Peoples Party, the party of President Asif Ali Zardari, has disowned any reform of the blasphemy laws and has been conspicuously quiet amid the uproar. Historian Mubarak Ali says all of the mainstream parties have emboldened the religious right by kowtowing to the radical clerics who are roiling the streets.

“Instead of fighting, instead of challenging — they just surrendered,” he says. “And now these clerics, they are so powerful, they are so bold, that now they are threatening everybody.”

‘No Other Alternative’

Farid Piracha, the deputy secretary general of Jamaat-e-Islami, Pakistan’s largest religious party, says “if there [were] justice in Pakistan,” there would be no eruptions on the streets.

The party’s Islamic revivalist message has pushed Pakistan toward conservatism while preaching the dangers of a perceived U.S. war on Islam.

The radical right is gathering strength in Pakistan conflating religious dogma with the policies of the United States. Piracha says they cannot be separated.

“There is damage of more than 30,000 innocent people during the so-called war against terrorism. So, one cannot believe that America is not against Islam. America’s total military actions are against the Muslim states,” he says.

U.S. drone attacks and the war in Afghanistan have provoked a popular outcry among Pakistanis, which radical Islamists exploit. Historian Ali says extremists have expanded their constituency by emerging as the only alternative voice in a country where millions feel under threat by everything from the faltering economy to the lack of security.

“They say that dictatorships didn’t give them anything. Democracy didn’t give them anything,” he says. “So, they are exhorted that Islam is going to solve their problems, give them dignity in the society and rule of law. Because there is no other alternative, they believed it.”

The extremists also benefit from the legacy of Zia al Haq, the 1980s dictator who undertook the Islamization of the schools that indoctrinated a generation in religious orthodoxy.

“As a result of this education,” Ali says, “they have very closed minds.”

Speaking Out

As religious passions stifle liberal voices, one group refuses to be repressed — the Ajoka Theater.

Ajoka Theater founder Madeeha Guahar on stage following a performance in Islamabad of a play about blasphemy. In the antisecular atmosphere following the Punjab governor’s assassination, the staging of the play is a rare example of secular society standing up against the intimidation of religious extremists. - Julie McCarthy/NPR

It’s been in the forefront of the struggle for a secular democratic Pakistan. This past week, it staged a disturbing production about blasphemy and dedicated it to the slain governor.

It’s a study in brutality, with white-robed clerics in league with black-clad followers haranguing their victims as they hang them.

“That this play was shown in Islamabad is an act of courage,” says audience member Pervez Hoodbhoy, a physicist and essayist. “This is a country that stands at the very verge of religious fascism.”

Hoodbhoy says he fears for the theater company.

“I don’t know when they might be targeted,” he says.

The theater founder and director of the play, Madeeha Guahar, says Ajoka will continue performing and take the risk.

Copyright 2011 NPR
URL: www.npr.org/2011/01/24/...secular-society

26 shots that sent Pakistan over the edge

washingtonpost.com > Print Edition > Sunday Outlook

26 shots that sent Pakistan over the edge

Pamela Constable
Washington Post Staff Writer

Sunday, January 23, 2011

ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN has reported from South Asia for more than a decade

At a fashionable plaza in this serene Pakistani capital, a few dozen people gather in the evenings at the spot where provincial governor Salman Taseer was gunned down on Jan. 4. More than the man, their candlelight vigils mourn the open debate and religious compassion that have been lost with the assassination of the outspoken liberal politician.

Fifteen miles away, in a working-class alley of Rawalpindi, thousands of people flock each day to the home of Mumtaz Qadri, the elite police guard who killed Taseer. Qadri is in jail now, but the site has become a shrine to what many Pakistanis see as his heroic act against a blasphemer who insulted their prophet. Someone has even put up posters of Qadri riding a white horse to heaven.

In the days since Taseer’s death, Pakistan has become a different country. The veneer of Western democracy has been ripped away, the liberal elite has been cowed into silence, and the civilian government has beaten a hasty retreat from morality, authority and law. Islamic extremist groups, once dismissed as unable to win more than a few seats in Parliament, are filling the streets, with bearded acolytes waving flags and chanting like giddy crowds at a post-game victory rally.

Suddenly, a crucial U.S. ally in the fight against terrorism seems incapable of stopping a tide of intolerant and violent Islam at home - raising doubts about Pakistan’s ability to play a constructive role in the war against the Taliban or to help the United States extricate its forces from Afghanistan, Pakistan’s northern neighbor.

Qadri, who happily confessed to murdering the politician he was assigned to protect, has little chance of being convicted. Instead of suffering ostracism, he was greeted with handshakes and garlands by courthouse lawyers, who offered to defend him pro bono. The provincial court system, notorious for freeing radical Islamic leaders, is unlikely to condemn a national religious hero.

“There is no justice in our country for the common man, but Qadri’s act against a blasphemer has made all Muslims feel stronger,” a shopkeeper in Rawalpindi told me. “They can punish him, but what will they do with a million Qadris who have been born now?”

Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gillani, whose ruling coalition recently recovered from near-collapse, has reassured the restive Muslim masses that not a word of Pakistan’s blasphemy law will be changed. One of the harshest such statutes in the Muslim world, it makes any purported slur against the prophet Muhammad - even a misinterpreted remark or a discarded Koran - grounds for execution.

Taseer had proposed softening the law. Another legislator who did the same has received death threats. The police, whose ranks produced the killer, seem duped or complicit. The army, caught between fighting the Taliban and courting public opinion, has remained prudently silent.

Pakistani commentators have expressed shock at the public lionization of Qadri and the demonization of Taseer, who did nothing worse than criticize the blasphemy law and commiserate with a Christian peasant woman who was sentenced to death under it. The atmosphere is so charged now that most clerics refused to officiate at Taseer’s funeral, and the Christian woman’s prison warden said he may not be able to protect her even from the guards.

For the past several years, a few voices have warned against the growth of religious hatred in Pakistan. Columnist Kamila Hyat described a “Talibanization of minds” creeping across the country, emboldening extremist groups and censoring debate. Physicist and activist Pervez Hoodbhuy decried the quashing of critical thought in Pakistani schools and the rote Koranic learning that shapes many young minds.

But in Friday sermons and at many levels of Pakistani society, one hears warnings about creeping Westernization, secular culture and forceful aggression against Islam by America and its allies. When Pope Benedict XVI called for a repeal of Pakistan’s blasphemy law this month, some Muslim clerics decried it as part of the foreign conspiracy and said the pope was inviting attacks on minority Christians in Pakistan.

Some observers here say it is unfair to tar millions of Pakistani Muslims as extremists just because they feel strongly enough about the sacred nature of the prophet Muhammad to justify killing someone who insults him. What is needed, they say, is stronger national leaders who will uphold the laws - against blasphemy and murder alike. “This is an Islamic republic, and people feel very strongly about the blasphemy issue,” said Hamid Mir, a leading television journalist here. “We have to respect that, but we also have to respect the law and the constitution, or we will be lost.”

Others argue that a mind-set that finds spiritual justification for shooting a government official 26 times will also accept the public flogging of drunks, the beheading of policemen and the stoning of unmarried lovers - all hallmarks of the Taliban forces that swept through Pakistan’s scenic Swat Valley two years ago.

Pakistan’s army, a close partner of the U.S. military, ultimately drove the Taliban out of Swat after cementing public opinion in its favor. Now Washington is prodding army leaders here to extend their campaign to other insurgent-infested tribal areas.

But public opinion in Pakistan today is not what it was a year ago, and no one wants to risk igniting popular wrath. Not the nuclear-armed security establishment, which still sees Islamic militants as a useful tool to harass arch-rival India. Not the weak, unpopular government, saddled by a secular past and still reeling from the slaying of its most charismatic leader, Benazir Bhutto, three years ago.

In recent days I have listened to Islamic activists rant about the sanctity of the prophet and the evil of those who offend him or dare to question any tents of Islam. They even have a label for such dangerous subversives, which translates roughly as “ought to be killed.”

But there is one conversation that haunts me in particular, an encounter I had with a young man on a flight between Islamabad and Karachi. He was neatly dressed and beardless, a recent science graduate on his way to a job interview. As I read through the morning papers and discarded them on the floor, I noticed him squirming.

“Madam, could you please pick up the papers?” he finally said. “The name of our prophet is on the front page, and it must not be on the ground.”

I complied, and we spoke cordially about our respective religions. But when I asked about Taseer’s murder, his tone changed. “They say he blasphemed against our prophet,” the young man said solemnly. “If this is true, then it would be my duty as a Muslim to kill him, too.”

Pamela Constable, a Washington Post foreign correspondent, is the author of the forthcoming “Playing With Fire: Why Pakistan’s Democracy Is Losing Ground to Islamic Extremists.”

©2011 The Washington Post Company
URL: www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/.../AR2011012300278.html

In Pakistan, Islamic hard-liners expanding their grip on society

WORLD

In Pakistan, Islamic hard-liners expanding their grip on society

The killing of a governor opposed to the nation's blasphemy law, and the warm reception for his accused killer, has exposed Islamic fundamentalists' growing sway over the nation.

Pakistanis chant slogans as they gather to show their support outside the Rawalpindi home of Mumtaz Hussain Qadri, who is accused of killing Punjab Gov. Salman Taseer. (Aamir Qureshi, AFP/Getty Images / January 21, 2011)

By Alex Rodriguez, Los Angeles Times
January 21, 2011

Reporting from Rawalpindi, Pakistan — Above a dank, darkened teahouse pungent with the aroma of green chili peppers, a bright blue banner depicts a neighborhood cleric, Qari Hanif Qureshi, declaring: “Anyone opposing laws protecting the sanctity of the prophet Muhammad is condemned!“

Such dire exhortations from local imams are embraced by millions of impoverished Pakistanis scraping by in squalid, dust-choked city neighborhoods and mud-hut settlements.

Mumtaz Hussain Qadri, a 26-year-old police commando assigned to guard Punjab Gov. Salman Taseer, says Qureshi’s preachings inspired him to assassinate Taseer on Jan. 4. And on a recent afternoon inside the teahouse, another Qureshi follower, Muhammad Zahir, said he was equally moved.

“If I were there, I would have done the same thing,” says Zahir, 26, scooping up boiled lentils with a piece of bread. “Qadri has brought honor upon his family. He’s a hero now.”

The killing, carried out by a man who saw Taseer as an apostate for opposing Pakistan’s blasphemy law, has exposed the rising influence that Islamic fundamentalism has over Pakistani society, a mind-set that increasingly radicalizes the nuclear-armed nation, breeds intolerance and further weakens Islamabad’s feeble civilian government.

Led by clerics at the helm of the country’s religious political parties and its hard-line mosques and madrasas, the extremists demonstrated their reach after Taseer was assassinated in an upscale neighborhood of Islamabad. Days later, fundamentalist clerics rallied more than 40,000 people on the streets of Karachi in support of Qadri. A day earlier in Qadri’s Rawalpindi neighborhood, at least 4,000 people had gathered in front of the accused assassin’s house, chanting, “Salute to your bravery, Mumtaz!“

At Qadri’s court appearances, lawyers have showered him with flower petals and kissed his cheeks, a worrisome sign that his support stretches far beyond Pakistan’s underclass and into the upper echelons of society.

Hard-line clerics are now turning their anger toward another leading member of the ruling Pakistan People’s Party, lawmaker Sherry Rehman, who, like Taseer, called for changes aimed at reforming the blasphemy law after a Pakistani Christian woman accused of insulting the prophet Muhammad was given the death penalty.

Journalist Ali Kamran Chishti attended a Jan. 7 gathering in Karachi at which Munir Ahmed Shakir, imam of the Sultan mosque, labeled Rehman an infidel for proposing changes to the law to remove the death penalty as an option for punishment and require prosecutors to prove that the alleged blasphemy was intentional and not inadvertent. Pakistan’s blasphemy law makes it a crime to defame the prophet Muhammad or Islam, but is often used as a tool to repress minorities.

“This kind of rhetoric radicalizes people,” Chishti said. Imams such as Shakir, he added, “are slowly poisoning minds and making people intolerant. Praising people like Qadri is indirectly saying to society that anyone who takes this line [against the blasphemy law] should be shot dead. This is wrong.”

The outpouring of praise for Qadri also sends disturbing signals to Washington. At a time when the Obama administration is hoping for a more reliable ally in the U.S.-declared war on terrorism, the Taseer assassination and its aftermath suggest extremism in Pakistan may be going mainstream.

“A mind-set has been created that has to be undone,” said Ijaz Khan, who heads the international relations department at the University of Peshawar. “It poses a serious existential challenge to the so-called liberal community of this country.

“We still do not know how many more Qadris are out there,” Khan added, “and what will happen next.”

Pakistan’s religious extremists thrive on street power rather than on ballot-box appeal. In elections in 2008, religious parties collectively garnered less than 5% of the vote. Founded as a moderate Islamic state, Pakistan is governed by the largely secular Pakistan People’s Party.

But in the thousands of mosques and madrasas across the nation, fundamentalists enjoy a captive audience. Hard-line clerics delivering fiery Friday sermons are seen as more credible than the country’s government leaders.

“If there was economic development and more job opportunities on the horizon, they wouldn’t be as apt to listen to these clerics,” said Hasan Askari Rizvi, a Lahore-based security analyst. “At least not all the time.”

The rise of the Islamists has its origins in the military rule of Gen. Zia ul-Haq, who in the 1980s forced a more conservative brand of Islam on the country. That resulted in the start-up of legions of madrasas, many of which became incubators for extremism.

Even state education under Zia “socialized young minds into religious orthodoxy,” Rizvi said. “Now these people who studied in high schools and state universities from 1985 onward are the ones who support this kind of far-right religious orientation.”

The large show of support for Qadri has both stunned and intimidated Pakistani secularists. Though several commentators on television and in newspapers have denounced the praise Qadri has received, top leaders within President Asif Ali Zardari’s administration have been conspicuously quiet amid the furor.

The government has even tried to sound conciliatory: This week Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani stressed that authorities have no plans to tamper with the country’s blasphemy law — a clear attempt to appease hard-line religious leaders angered by talk of amendments to the law.

Whether such gestures calm the toxic debate over Taseer’s assassination remains to be seen. The Sunni Ittehad Council, an influential assembly of Pakistani Muslim clerics, has vowed to hold rallies in major cities in defense of the blasphemy law this month.

“If we want peace in our country,” said Hanif Tayyab, the council’s general secretary, “we should try to understand that freedom of expression has some limits.”

alex.rodriguez@latimes.com

Copyright © 2011, Los Angeles Times
URL: www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la...3266594.story

Religious frenzy grips Pakistan

Thursday, January 20, 2010, Safar 14, 1432 

Religious frenzy grips Pakistan

Random Thoughts

Burhanuddin Hasan

There is hardly any doubt that Muslims, can lay down their lives to uphold and protect the honour and dignity of the Holy Prophet Mohammad (Peace be upon him). His name comes after God in Quran and as Maulana Roomi says “You are ,in short, the most exalted after God.” In Sura Al Ahzab God says “God and His angels shower blessing on the Prophet (PBUH). O believers you too send darood and salam to him (PBUH)”. The Holy Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) has the most exalted position among all Prophets sent by God. He (PBUH) was the only one called to the heavens by God on the night of Mairaj to honour him (PBUH) with his nearness. How can any Muslim have the courage to say a single word against his (PBUH) honour? If anybody does, he should be given death sentence with the due process of law. The Blasphemy Law was enacted during General Ziaul Haq’s rule. This was a man-made law and like all man-made laws could be reviewed from time to time if it is being misused by human beings like all laws. It is not a divine law enacted by God in Quran like some other laws. There are 57 Muslim countries in the world which, do not have any such law on their Statute Books.

The Blasphemy Law has been used in some cases in Pakistan and culprits have been punished if their crime was proved in a court of law. The punishment was awarded by a judge like all punishments. Nobody should take this law into his or her hands and execute the culprit without the due process. In the case of a Christian girl Asia; she was booked under the Blasphemy Law and was awarded death penalty by a court of law. She sent a mercy petition to the Governor of Punjab Mr Salman Taseer who met her in good faith and promised to take up her mercy petition with the President for favourable consideration. He had a feeling that the girl might have been framed like many other cases of Blasphemy. Media unduly sensationalized this story as it does in many such cases these days to gain popularity.

The JUI Chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman who had left the Government on the sacking of one of his ministers in the Federal Cabinet by Prime Minister Gilani, pounced on this issue to take his revenge and gave a call for a nationwide agitation on the issue of Namoos-e-Risaalat, which was totally out of context but could add fuel to the fire of his revenge against the Prime Minister. All religious parties, which keep waiting for such an opportunity to hit the government, joined the agitation taking out big rallies all over the country. It should never be forgotten that these parties; particularly Jamat-e-Islami and the Deobandi group represented by Maulana Fazlur Rehman have always been against the very concept of Pakistan promoted by Iqbal and Jinnah for the Muslims of India as a modern forward looking State as against a theocratic one which was the demand of religious parties..However, when Pakistan came into being they converged on it to change its ideology. They did not succeed but they keep trying. Iqbal who was a great philosopher and scholar of Islam has written a lot about the ignorance of Mullahs.

But it is regrettable that our educational institutions are not teaching these words to our youth who are blindly following the very Mullahs who were against Pakistan. Returning to the tragic murder of Salman Taseer by his misguided security guard who is being idolized by some youth under the influence of the Mullahs is highly regrettable. They should realize that this was not a case of violation of the Holy Prophet’s Namoos (Naoozo Billah). It was a humanitarian effort and his duty as the Governor of Punjab to find out whether a girl belonging to the Christian minority community who claims that she has been falsely framed in a crime she did not commit, is right or wrong? It was his duty to put the girl’s petition to the President. This was by no means a violation of the Namoos-e Risaalat .The security guard who was on duty to protect the life of the Governor, is guilty of murder and will certainly be punished. Those who are idolizing him should also be punished.

It seems the government which is surrounded by all sorts of fears for its survival is hesitating to take bold action against the political parties which have opened the Pandora’s Box over the blasphemy issue at this time when the country is facing economic crises, religious terrorism and corruption. This matter if not tackled with courage and bold action against those elements that unnecessarily launched a mass hysteria on this highly explosive issue, may destabilize the country. One would expect the Supreme Court to take notice of this issue and take action against the criminal elements who are exploiting the name of Islam for an issue which is basically legal.

The media too needs to be directed to use restraint in reporting and commenting on the delicate and sensitive subject of blasphemy. Full marks to PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari who has raised his voice in defense of minority communities and has denounced the uncalled for religious frenzy, let loose by the Mullahs which may destabilize the country.

© Pakistan Observer 1998-2011, All rights reserved
URL: http://pakobserver.net/detailnews.asp?id=72090

Blasphemy allegations: Another Christian family on the run

Pakistan Punjab

Blasphemy allegations: Another Christian family on the run

Rana TanveerRana Tanveer
June 07, 2010

Supporters of one of several Namoos-i-Risalat groups, Shahab Islami Pakistan chant slogans and wave flags during a rally to support the assassin of Salmaan Taseer in Rawalpindi. PHOTO: AFP

LAHORE: Two Christian women were beaten and publically humiliated by an angry mob over apparently frivolous blasphemy allegations and they and their family are now in hiding for fear of being killed, The Express Tribune has learnt.

“None of our relatives is ready to let us stay with them. They fear the wrath of the extremists, particularly after the assassination of Salmaan Taseer,” a male member of the family said over the phone from an undisclosed location.

The family and a non-governmental organisation that is helping them asked that their identities not be revealed, lest it put them in further danger. The names mentioned here are fictitious.

According to the family, the allegations stem from a dispute between Amina, a Muslim, and her sister-in-law Zahira, a Christian, in an East Lahore locality. The two got into an argument on Tuesday night and though it appeared to have been settled, on Wednesday morning, after her husband Zahid had gone to work, Amina walked out onto the street and started shouting that Zahira had abused the Holy Prophet (pbuh).

A short while later, a group of men led by Muhammad Sameer, a member of a religious organisation keen on raising its sectarian profile, forced their way into the house and started slapping Zahira, said another of her brothers, Sohail. “Other men and women from the neighbourhood started gathering at the house too and they beat up my sister and mother. They were the only people in the house,” he said.

“We tried our best to get her to confess her crime,” Sameer told The Express Tribune. As a member of the religious organisation, he said he could not tolerate any derogatory remarks about the Holy Prophet (pbuh).

Sameer added that he was very proud of his wife’s performance during the mob beating. “She beat Zahira more than anyone else. Her hand is so swollen that she hasn’t been able to make rotis since the day of the incident. I’ve been getting my meals from a restaurant,” he said.

Malik Mumtaz Qadri, the self-confessed assassin of Salmaan Taseer, is a member of the same group as Sameer. The group also runs a twenty-four hour cable TV channel.

Khadim Hazoor, Sameer’s son-in-law and another participant in the beating, said that the women’s faces were blackened and they were made to wear necklaces of shoes and paraded around the locality on donkeys to humiliate them. He said the women denied blaspheming and repeatedly touched their feet seeking mercy.

He said the people of the locality would not allow Zahid or his family to return to their house, which he lives next door to. He claimed that the fight between Zahira and Amina the night before the incident revolved around the upbringing of Zahid and Amina’s 18-month-old daughter. Amina had wanted to raise her daughter as a Muslim, but Zahira wanted her niece to be raised as a Christian, he said.

Hazoor accused Zahid of “cheating Islam” by pretending to convert from Christianity to Islam so he could marry the Muslim girl. “We will not let them live in this house. He has not only cheated Amina but also Islam,” he said.

Zameer Khan, an NGO worker, helped the family flee the locality after they were attacked. “Apparently there was no blasphemy, just an argument between two women,” he said.

He said after hearing of the incident, he had reached the scene to find the women being attacked. He said he had asked the mob if anyone had heard Zahira utter any blasphemous remarks, to which they all replied in the negative. He said he persuaded them to let the women go while he investigated the matter. He then helped relocate the family temporarily. He said he had also convinced the mob not to involve the police.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 15th, 2011.

URL: http://tribune.com.pk/story/103891/blasphemy...run/

Pakistan’s Pols Paralyzed by Religious Extremism

World

Pakistan’s Pols Paralyzed by Religious Extremism

Thursday, Jan. 13, 2011 By Omar Waraich / Islamabad

Pakistani Islamists attend a rally supporting the blasphemy law on Jan. 9, 2011, in Karachi. Asif Hassan/AFP/Getty Images

Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari will visit the White House on Friday, amid growing U.S. concern that his country is drifting into the embrace of Islamist extremism. The brutal assassination of Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer, over his moves to reform a blasphemy law used to persecute religious minorities, has been a shocking indicator: Taseer was shot 27 times by one of his own bodyguards, while the others looked on. The murder was widely celebrated in Pakistan, and its confessed perpetrator, Mumtaz Qadri, has been lionized by tens of thousands of demonstrators on the street, while the liberal element personified by Taseer has been marginalized. The unrestrained march of extremism in the world’s second largest Muslim nation — the only one with nuclear weapons — and on whose support the U.S. is depending in Afghanistan is a clear cause for anxiety in Washington. “Societies that tolerate such actions,” Vice President Joe Biden told reporters during a brief visit to Islamabad on Wednesday, “end up being consumed by those actions.”

Still, despite worrying signs, it’s easy to overstate the Islamist challenge. Pakistan’s religious parties remain at the political margins, usually sharing between them less than 10% of the vote. “It’s the secular forces that have always been in power, whether it was the military or the main political parties,” says opposition lawmaker Ayaz Amir. “The clerical forces are entitled to articulate whatever they want to. But who’s been succumbing, who’s been doing the backtracking? It’s the secular forces.” Successive governments have attempted for political reasons to placate the religious right with concessions. The same principle was evident in the current government’s capitulation to the conservatives on the blasphemy law, making clear in the wake of Taseer’s murder that it has no intention of pursuing his effort to reform the measure.

Taseer’s assassination certainly presented a formidable challenge, by bringing together erstwhile enemies in the religious camp in a rare show of unity. The crowd of 40,000 on the streets of Karachi last weekend celebrating Taseer’s murder included such sects as the typically moderate Barelvis, their more hard-line rival Deobandis, the even more extreme Wahhabis, and even the Shi’ites so often targeted by the more extreme Sunni sects. Groups that are more inclined to fight one another than to pray together have found common cause on blasphemy. “It’s the one issue where you can put together more people on the streets than are willing to vote for you,” says analyst Mosharraf Zaidi. The religious right now feels emboldened by the impassiveness of secular parties and the state: no one who threatened to kill Taseer and other like-minded politicians has been arrested.

Among the keenest supporters of Qadri was the Sunni Tehreek, an armed group headquartered in Karachi that opposes the Taliban and related extremists. The group has donated a reward to Qadri’s family and issued threats against Taseer’s daughter. “Qadri did what he did out of his religious conviction,” says Fahimuddin Sheikh, a spokesman for the Sunni Tehreek. But, he adds, “We are very much against the Taliban and the terrorists. We haven’t just supported the army’s offensives against them, but mounted rallies in support of them. These are people who want to use the gun to impose their views.” Which, of course, is exactly what Taseer’s assassin appears to have been doing.

Like Qadri, the members of the Sunni Tehreek are drawn from the Barelvi sect, estimated to make up 80% of the population. In recent years, Barelvi shrines and leaders have been attacked by Taliban-affiliated militants who deem their practices heretical. But when it comes to defending the “honor of the Prophet,” the Barelvis can be fiercer than other sects, and Taseer’s opposition to the blasphemy laws was cast as an act of blasphemy. It was always misleading to cast the Barelvis as exemplars of tolerance, says lawmaker Amir. “This impression really comes down to the Barelvis’ support for our recent wars against the Taliban,” he adds. “Otherwise they’ve been involved in the spread of religiosity in Pakistani society. That’s the problem with Pakistan: too much religion.”

The spread of religiosity has created a sense of religious guilt and shame in much of mainstream Pakistan, analysts say, pulling the consensus in a more conservative direction. Within hours of the killing, some 2,000 Pakistanis, most conversant in English, had joined a Facebook fan page dedicated to Qadri before it was shut down. They were not fundamentalists, nor were they averse to Western culture. “If you go through the profiles of Qadri supporters on Facebook, you’d think Justin Bieber was the cause of extremism in Pakistan,” tweeted the Pakistani blogger Kala Kawa. Says analyst Zaidi: “Articulating love for the Prophet is a way people purge their guilt. They see blasphemy as a red line, and if it’s seen to be crossed, they say they’re on board.”

Pakistani tensions over religion don’t exist independently of the tensions of social class in this grotesquely unequal society. After Taseer’s assassination, many liberals discovered to their horror that their domestic staff didn’t share their grief; some smiled at the news. Even though the governor had come from a modest background, many Pakistanis saw him as epitomizing a wealthy, English-speaking, liberal elite. “If you’re from the Urdu-schooled mainstream of the country, the assertiveness of the class rubs you the wrong way,” says Zaidi. “And it’s easy to depict someone who’s outwardly Westernized as being distant from religion.” Taseer’s status as a high-profile politician also diluted any sympathy for him from those sections of the population resentful of a political class they perceive as being inept, distant and venal.

Opposition to the U.S. war in Afghanistan and the Taliban’s claim to represent a purer form of Islam made it difficult for the Pakistani authorities to rally public support against the domestic extremist challenge. It was only after the Pakistani Taliban revealed its brutality in parts of the country over which it had gained control that public support swung behind a military offensive to drive them out. But Taseer’s assassination is an uncomfortable reminder of a religious intolerance deeply embedded within the country’s mainstream, which no Pakistani government is likely to risk confronting head-on.

© 2011 Time Inc. All rights reserved
URL: www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2042522,00.html

Taseer murder: Sunni Ittehad warns against protests

PAKISTAN Punjab

Taseer murder: Sunni Ittehad warns against protests

Rana Tanveer
January 10, 2010

Children protesting in front of Lahore Press Club against any change in blasphemy law. PHOTO: RIAZ AHMAD/ EXPRESS

LAHORE: A Tahaffuz Namoos-i-Risalat conference held in the city on Sunday warned against public rallies and demonstrations praising Governor Salmaan Taseer or protesting his killing. A Mumtaz Qadri, speakers threatened, would be at every corner of the country to stop such displays of solidarity, a reference to the police guard who has confessed to killing the governor.

Maulana Nawaz Kharal, a spokesperson for the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC), led the chorus while addressing the conference held at Aiwan-i-Iqbal. Kharal also said there should be no protest against Qadri and added, “Don’t associate Mumtaz with any terrorist group. He is a true lover of the Holy Prophet (pbuh).” He said his Sunni followers protect Qadri and his family with their lives.

SIC chairman Fazle Karim too condemned protests in favour of Salmaan Taseer. Karim said the NGOs protesting the governors’ death had never held any protest against the killings at Sunni gatherings after the attacks at Jamia Naeemia, Nishtar Park in Karachi, Data Darbar, shrines of Abdullah Shah Ghazi and Farid Ganj Shakar. He said they had not even raised a voice against the ban on the veil imposed in France. He said his followers would continue “the mission of Ghazi Ilamudin Shaheed.” He said the Sunni Tehrik would provide legal assistance to Qadri.

Dr Muhammad Ashraf Asif Jalali, founder of Idara Sirat-i-Mustaqeem Pakistan, announced the Ghazi Ilmudin Award for Qadri. He said that his group would lay a wreath on Ilmudin’s grave on Qadri’s behalf on January 15. He also said that it would hold a rally on January 19 from Lahore to Qadri’s residence in Rawalpindi.

Jalali then demanded that the government release Qadri as soon as possible and exonerate him from the charge of murder. He said the punishment for a blasphemer against the Holy Prophet (pbuh) was death. He claimed that the inclusion of Section 295-C in the Pakistan Penal Code had brought good luck for the country. He went on to say that all participants in Taseer’s funeral had jeopardised their Islamic faith. He said their participation in the prayers had put a question mark on their commitment to the community of the faithful.

The participants of the conference included Justice (retd) Nazeer Akhtar, former judge Nazeer Ghazi, Pir Sayed Karamat Ali and Dr Raghib Naeemi. After the conference ended, a group of SIC activists headed to the Governor’s House gate on The Mall on a van and chanted slogans in support of Qadri.Earlier, nearly 300 Sunni Tehrik activists had held a protest rally in front of the Lahore Press Club demanding Qadri’s immediate release. Participants of the rally also chanted slogans against the protestors in favour of Taseer.

In the only civil society rally after Taseer’s assassination on January 4, the participants had condemned the murder which they said was a result of religious extremism.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 10th, 2011.

URL: http://tribune.com.pk/story/101580/taseer...against-protests/