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Religious Minorities and Blasphemy Laws Clash Again in Pakistan
An Ahmadi woman charged with blasphemy faces an uncertain future.
International and U.S. human rights groups have begun an urgent campaign on behalf of a woman recently jailed in Pakistan on blasphemy charges.
55-year old Ramazan Bibi, a member of a minority religious community of Ahmadis, was arrested and imprisoned in April under a Pakistani anti-blasphemy law which carries the death penalty.
Under the controversial law, anyone found guilty of the crime of blasphemy can be sentenced to death. Pakistan has yet to execute someone for blasphemy, but the law, and the charge when levied against a minority religious community member, has already cost lives in Pakistan.
Mob violence has frequently accompanied accusations of blasphemy, as have assassinations relating to other cases of people charged under the law.
During the Asia Bibi case, the last high-profile religious blasphemy case in Pakistan, both Salman Taseer, then governor of the Punjab, and Minorities Minister Shahbaz Bhatti were assassinated in 2011 for advocacy on Bibi’s behalf.
Attorneys who represent clients accused of blasphemy have also been killed or threatened into abandoning these controversial cases.