Wednesday, November 22, 2017
In Islamabad, Muslims Marched to Demand the Death of Asia Bibi
More than a thousand Muslims have taken to the streets to impel the Government to execute her
November 16, La Gaceta.- In 2009, Asia Bibi, a Pakistani Catholic, knelt to drink water from a well. Seeing her quench her thirst, a group of Muslim women accused her of having polluted, by virtue of her Christian condition, that water that had hitherto been pure. Bibi replied to this with unspeakable courage: 'I believe in my religion and in Jesus Christ, who died on the cross for the sins of humanity. What did your prophet Muhammad do to save mankind?
Accused of blasphemy against the Koran for this assertion, a court sentenced Bibi to death, who, from then on, would live a true legal calvary. Minority Minister Shabahz Bhatti and Punjab Governor Saalman Taser (both assassinated in terrorist attacks), worked hard to free her from an illegitimate sentence, but social pressure went the other way: it demanded the strictest application of the blasphemy law, which, based on the Sharia, is responsible for more than 1,000 convictions in Pakistan.
In October 2016, as a result of the refusal of a judge to participate in it, the definitive trial for the release - or final execution - of this Catholic mother was postponed without a date. Since then, the international pressure to save Bibi has vigorously continued and hope remains unscathed.
Recently, the case of Asia Bibi has drawn renewed interest. That is why, more than a thousand Muslims have taken to the streets of Islamabad, the Pakistani capital, in order to impel both the Government and the Supreme Court to execute the faithful Catholic. The protesters, who belong to various Islamic fundamentalist groups, have also called for the release of imprisoned Muslim religious leaders and the dismissal of Justice Minister Zahid Amid.