Barnabas Fund - International Headquarters River Street, Pewsey, Wilthire. Phone: +44 1672 565030 Latitude: 51 deg 23 min 18 sec N Longitude: 1 deg 45 min 48 sec W .
Home
News
Archives
Muslim groups in Pakistan speak out for ...

Email:

Muslim groups in Pakistan speak out for Christian girl accused of blasphemy

To

Email address:
Separate multiple addresses with a comma (,). Maximum of 10

From

Your name:
Your email address:
Security test:
Please enter the numbers that appear here in the box below.
 refresh captcha
CAPTCHA Image
Security code:

Details provided here will never be used in any other context

Published: 09:00 GMT Daylight Time - Thursday 30 August 2012

Muslim groups in Pakistan speak out for Christian girl accused of blasphemy

Country/Region: South and East Asia, Pakistan

“This is the first time in the history of Pakistan that the Muslim community and scholars have stood up for non-Muslims.”

Sajid Ishaq, chairman of the Pakistan Interfaith League

Islamic groups in Pakistan, including the country’s leading body of Muslim clerics, have come out in support of Rimsha Masih, the Christian girl with Down’s syndrome falsely accused of blasphemy, in an unprecedented and welcome move.

Family_in_Maherabad_Islamabad_2_4X3.jpg
Hundreds of Christians fled Maherabad after Rimsha was accused of blasphemy

The All Pakistan Ulema Council (APUC), which includes representatives from fundamentalist groups, called for an “impartial and thorough investigation into the case” and for “strict action” to be taken against Rimsha’s accusers if she is found innocent.

Other Islamic groups, including Difa-e-Pakistan Council (DPC) and Khatm-e-Nabuwwat, plus the Pakistan Interfaith League, which comprises minority religious groups, have also backed the young Christian girl.   

APUC chairman Allama Tahir Ashrafi said this was “a test case for Pakistan’s Muslims, Pakistan’s minorities and for the government”. He condemned the mobs who regularly pressurise police into registering blasphemy cases, saying that it was like the “law of the jungle”, and called for the government to “make this case an example so that nobody will dare misuse the blasphemy law in future”.

Mr Ashrafi, who is also part of the leadership of a coalition of Islamist organisations, Defence of Pakistan Council, said:

We don’t want to see injustice done with anyone. We will work to end this climate of fear. The accusers should be proceeded against with full force, so that no one would dare make spurious allegations.

He also spoke out in defence of the hundreds of Christian families who were forced to flee their homes in Maherabad village amid a violent Muslim backlash, urging the government to take action to protect them. Mr Ashrafi said:

This is inhuman that those who have nothing to do with the case or are not a party to it are also being harassed.

Rimsha, who was arrested after being accused on 16 August of burning pages of a Noorani Qaida, a booklet used to learn the basics of the Quran, is being held in a maximum-security jail and is said to be deeply traumatised by her ordeal.

Following a medical examination, Rimsha’s age has been determined as between 13 and 14, though her mental age is below her chronological age. This means that her case will go before a juvenile court, which is likely to treat her with greater leniency.

A court adjourned today (Thursday 30 August) a bail hearing for Rimsha until Saturday (1 September).  

Her father, Misrek Masih, has appealed to Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari to pardon the youngster. He said:

We are afraid for her life… I’m asking President Asif Ali Zadari, who has already called for further attention into my daughter’s case, to pardon her and to prevent other people from being persecuted under these harsh laws like my daughter.

Help us: Share this article

Email:

Muslim groups in Pakistan speak out for Christian girl accused of blasphemy

To

Email address:
Separate multiple addresses with a comma (,). Maximum of 10

From

Your name:
Your email address:
Security test:
Please enter the numbers that appear here in the box below.
 refresh captcha
CAPTCHA Image
Security code:

Details provided here will never be used in any other context

christian, persecution, charity, church, persecuted, sookhdeo, Islam

Other articles

Latest Emergency

/_images_files/content/article_files/Pakistan/201306/Building-work-4X3.jpg

Follow Barnabas

or

receive news & appeal emails as they are published

From Twitter

From Twitter_icon

  • Editorial: Nigeria needs help to defeat Boko Haram http://bit.ly/16bBvG1 3 hours ago

  • Obama called to act against countries that violate religious freedom http://bit.ly/197HeeB 3 hours ago

  • Tanzanian pastor in intensive care after being attacked with machetes at his home. http://ow.ly/mbgPV 8 hours ago

  • Four converts to Christianity jailed, two others given suspended sentence, amid Iranian presidential elections http://ow.ly/m6BPh Mon, Jun 2013 17:04

  • #Christian killed in Egypt church attack; Christian businesses destroyed http://bit.ly/190VjKT Thu, Jun 2013 14:49

Read more...

Daily prayer

Daily prayer_icon

  • In another chilling sign of Egypt’s move towards becoming an Islamic state, it was announced in March that a religious police force had been established to uphold Muslim morals. The Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice shares its name with the notorious religious police of Saudi Arabia. For some months previously, vigilante Salafist gangs had been operating as self-appointed enforcers of morals, raiding shops and harassing staff and customers. The Christian community is concerned that it may now be subjected to the demands of sharia law. Pray that this will not happen and that the Islamisation of Egyptian society will be checked and then reversed. Subscribe to the prayer points rss feed 23 hours ago

  • Christian girls in Egypt are extremely vulnerable to being kidnapped by Salafists who forcibly convert them to Islam and marry them to Muslim men against their will; over 500 have been victims of this heartless campaign since the revolution of January 2011. The Association of Victims of Abduction and Enforced Disappearance (AVAED), an Egyptian Christian organisation, says that the authorities collude with the Salafists. Give thanks for the safe return of Agape Essam Girgis (13), who was abducted from el-Ameriya on 23 December 2012. Sadly, most cases do not have a happy ending. Pray that the Lord will comfort those families whose daughters are still missing and intervene mightily to deliver the Christian girls from the hands of their captors. Subscribe to the prayer points rss feed Tue, Jun 2013 00:00

  • Pray for our brothers and sisters in North Africa living in the shadow of militant Islamism. Following the French intervention against Islamist groups who had taken over large parts of Mali, militants attacked a gas facility in Algeria in January and killed 37 people. An Algerian employee who managed to escape said, “We were told that because we were Muslim we would not be killed, and it was only the Christians they were after.” The Islamists associate Christianity with the West, so Christian targets and individuals as well as Western ones are especially vulnerable to attack. Ask that the Lord will protect Christians in the region against violence and the oppressive grip of sharia law. Subscribe to the prayer points rss feed Mon, Jun 2013 00:00

  • “I had just cooked my last meal, and there was no food in the house, nor money, nor any other way of obtaining grain. Thank the Lord for this aid, which has saved me and my children.” Bâh Kamaté, a Christian widow with six children in Mali, was “completely overwhelmed” when her pastor told her that she was going to receive corn and rice funded by Barnabas. Thousands of Christians fled the north of the country after the Islamist takeover in 2012, and their plight was worsened by food shortages resulting from drought. But praise God that Barnabas has helped to supply food for more than 5,100 Christians, as well as meeting other needs. Pray for His continuing provision for His people as Mali continues to face an uncertain future. Subscribe to the prayer points rss feed Sun, Jun 2013 00:00

  • Those who become Christians in Laos risk losing everything. A couple from Chumpoy in the Sanamsai district of Attappeu province were thrown out of their village on 23 January for converting to Christianity. Pray for Sakien and his wife Dong, who came to Christ after hearing the testimony of their son and daughter-in-law, Sanien and Pitsamai; they had become Christians after Pitsamai was healed after prayer. Sakien and Dong are currently sheltering in a partially constructed church building in another village; pray that they will either be able to return to their home or find adequate housing elsewhere, and that the Lord will sustain them in their new faith throughout this trial. Subscribe to the prayer points rss feed Sat, Jun 2013 00:00

Read more...

Quick navigation

© Barnabas Fund 1997 - 2013 All rights reserved.
Barnabas Fund & Barnabas Aid are registered trade marks