Free Asia Bibi! Pakistani Court Refuses Pardon for Christian Woman Sentenced to Death

[SolomonVII]

And these people are our 'allies'.

Yes, these are the good ones.

 

[Michie]

Life-or-Death Blasphemy Drama in Pakistan

ANTO AKKARA
But did Asia Bibi even say what they say she said? And what does the future hold for the country’s oppressed Christians?
Read

 

[Michie]

Last week we told you about the bounty now on Asia Bibi's head from Maulana Yousef Qureshi. Today, our friends at Mission Network News are reporting the following.

Pakistan (MNN) ― A Pakistani woman receives yet another threat to her life. Asia Bibi, a Christian in Pakistan who was accused of blasphemy in 2009, is faced with a potential judicial death sentence in her case in addition to death threats from Islamic groups who protest against her.
Carl Moeller with Open Doors USA says, "The latest tragic development is that a hardline cleric in Pakistan is actually offering a reward for anyone who will kill Asia Bibi if the government does not put her to death."

The announcement was made by Maulana Yousef Qureshi at a rally in the northwestern town of Peshwar. He told people that his mosque would give $6,000 to the person who would take Asia Bibi's life.

In June of 2009, Bibi had been in a heated argument with some Islamic women and was called "infidel," she but had dismissed it and went on with her regular tasks for the day. Later, a group of Muslims accused her of blasphemy against the Muslim Prophet Muhammad and dragged her away.

Her family reported the incident, and police took her into custody. The courts then proceeded to charge her with blasphemy, and she has been in jail waiting her final sentence.

Open Doors reports Asia Bibi saying to a Compass Direct News reporter, "How can an innocent person be accused, have a case in court after a false FIR [First Information Report], and then be given the death sentence, without even once taking into consideration what he or she has to say?"

Continued- http://www.persecutionblog.com/2010/12/asia-bibi-receives-more-death-threats.html#tp

 

[Michie]

Christians should not forget about Asia Bibi – the first woman to be sentenced to death for alleged blasphemy in Pakistan – as the country’s high court decides on a date for her appeals hearing, said a ministry that advocates on behalf of persecuted Christians.

Bibi’s case should not be swept under the rug and forgotten but Christians “must pray and advocate” on behalf of the innocent woman, said Carl Moeller, president and CEO of Open Doors USA, in a statement Monday.

“We continue to stand with Christians in Pakistan. We continue to help them face the incredible pressure – the almost unimaginable pressure – they are under every day, by spiritual means, by encouragement and through advocacy, speaking out on their behalf,” said Moeller.

As of Tuesday, the Lahore High Court has still not set a date for her appeals case. There was hope that President Asif Ali Zadari could pardon her before the hearing, but last week the court barred him from doing so.

It ruled that it is illegal for the government to pardon her while the case is pending.

Continued- http://www.christianpost.com/article/20101207/christians-must-not-forget-jailed-pakistani-womansays-ministry/

 

[Michie]

...Mohammed


Jamaat-e-Islami supporters chant slogans during the JI rally in Islamabad on Sunday, Dec. 5, 2010. (AP Photo/Anjum Naveed)

(CNSNews.com) – Thousands of Islamists gathered in the Pakistani capital on Sunday, warning the government not to touch the country’s blasphemy laws or to pardon a Christian woman on death row for allegedly blaspheming Mohammed.

The case of Asia (or Aasia) Bibi has triggered considerable debate in overwhelmingly Muslim Pakistan, where the federal government has been unwilling or unable to confront hard-line elements such as the fundamentalist cleric who has offered a reward to anyone who murders her.

Bibi, a 45 year-old mother, was sentenced to death by hanging on Nov. 8, 17 months after being arrested following allegations that she had insulted Islam’s prophet. She denied the claim, saying she had been falsely accused by Muslim co-workers who objected to sharing a water bowl with a Christian.

Appeals from Pope Benedict XVI and others prompted the governor of Punjab province, Salman Taseer, to ask President Asif Ali Zardari to pardon her.

Continued- http://cnsnews.com/news/article/threats-protests-surround-pakistani-chri

 

[SolomonVII]

Islamism, or militant Islam, or Islamofascism, or a label by any other name is a fact. It is something that is surging and threatening to pull under a good many countries—if not all— of the Islamic world.
Like the Ayatollah Khomeini putting a price tag on Salman Rushdie's head at the onset of this Islamic revolution, it is transnational, and asserts itself even beyond the ruling of the Pakistani high courts.

 

[Michie]

OTTAWA, Ontario, December 9, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Pro-life activist Mark Pickup is calling on the Canadian government to protest a Pakistani court’s decision to execute a Christian mother of five under the country’s blasphemy laws. He’s demanded further that the government offer the 45-year-old woman asylum and refugee status in Canada.

The Punjab native, named Asia Bibi, was imprisoned 18 months ago, and last month was sentenced to hang, after defending her faith in an argument with Muslim co-workers. The woman and her children were tortured by local men, and she says she was raped, before police came to arrest her on dubious charges that she had insulted Mohammed.

“I can not save all Christians who are persecuted or whose lives are in danger—and their are millions around the world—but I can try to save this Christian’s life,” Pickup wrote on his blog Wednesday. “Asia Bibi is my sister in Christ.”

Continued- http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/canadian-gvmt-urged-to-offer-asylum-to-pakistani-christian-facing-death

 

[JacktheCatholic]

And these people are our 'allies'.

Makes me wonder... how we are seen in the world arena.

 

[SolomonVII]

Makes me wonder... how we are seen in the world arena.

The world's left in general hates America.

And it is the rare Muslim who can rise above the indocrination that they receive from their countries' education system, continually reinforced as it is by the leftist press, that America indeed is the Great Satan working in concert with the Zionist to rule the world.
Imperialism and global zionist conspiracy are complementary terms describing the same reality,as reality is perceived by the world left and the House of Islam.

 

[Michie]

...NY

The Pakistan Christian Post is reporting that tomorrow, Dec. 10th the "Pakistani Christian Association in America and other organizations in New York will stage protest in front of Pakistani Consulate in New York at 10.00 AM, on December 10, 2010, for immediate release of Asia Bibi and repeal of blasphemy law."

Please keep this time in your prayers.

More information here.

 

[Michie]

Havovi Cooper is a Pakistani writer over at The Huffington Post and she has written a very interesting article, titled Asia Bibi and Pakistan's Selective Persecution.

As you read Cooper's article, keep in mind that she is neither Muslim or Christian, but rather calls herself a zoroastrian. Her comments are worth pondering.

I am a minority in Pakistan myself. Hailing from the Zoroastrian community, which has fewer than 2,000 people left in the biggest city, Karachi. I have never been overtly harassed by the Muslims surrounding me, but that may have more to do with the fact that I grew up in a metropolitan city with people who were exposed to diversity. Asia Bibi unfortunately was trapped in a small village in Punjab where tolerance is often more likely to be extended toward an animal than a human being from a different religion.

This case may lead most Westerners to cement their views of Muslims or Pakistanis as intolerable, religious fanatics who cannot tell right from wrong when it comes to their faith. And unfortunately, if Asia Bibi is forced to mete her fate at the gallows, I would have to agree with that viewpoint. That is the reason why it is important for all Pakistanis to be intolerant toward such intolerance and plead to our president, who's hands are supposedly tied by Islamic extremists and by stilted laws, to show that Pakistan as a nation will not stand by such hypocrisy. Having grown up in Pakistan, I know that the law is not impartial and that a poor person's suffering is not as important as that of a rich person and a woman's as that of a man. If a rich brat were to consume alcohol, steal or even kill in Pakistan it would not turn heads, but to establish religious absolutism and make an example of Asia bibi, is something the nation does not seem to be up in arms about.

Pakistani's are not the only ones who should feel responsible if she's put to death. Since America has inextricably tied its fate with Pakistan's, President Obama is now faced with a gift-wrapped situation whereby he can show that not only does America care about winning the war on terror, but it is also there to look out for the ordinary citizens of this country.

http://www.persecutionblog.com/2010/12/a-zoroastrian-comments-on-the-asia-bibi-case.html#tp

 

[SolomonVII]

Pakistani's are not the only ones who should feel responsible if she's put to death. Since America has inextricably tied its fate with Pakistan's, President Obama is now faced with a gift-wrapped situation whereby he can show that not only does America care about winning the war on terror, but it is also there to look out for the ordinary citizens of this country.

Really, this kind of thing really is the definition of the war on terror.
It not so much about flushing out ogres holed up in caves, as it is in finding ways to counter the vulgar ideals that these ogres in caves are flushing out onto the Islamic world.

 

[Michie]

Really, this kind of thing really is the definition of the war on terror.
It not so much about flushing out ogres holed up in caves, as it is in finding ways to counter the vulgar ideals that these ogres in caves are flushing out onto the Islamic world.

Exactly. We need to call the terrorists out that operate in broad daylight. If we don't do that...then I don't expect any of these people will take us seriously at all. We are too concerned about how we appear on the field of political correctness & tolerance to actually stand up for those that are repeatly terrorized & killed under these human right abuses that some seem to think is none of our business since it is not happening in our part of the world.

It's well known unless it serves a political purpose, we usually turn our heads. It is the coward's way. And these terrorists know that.

 

[Michie]

</IMG> Activists of the Pakistani fundamentalist party Jamiat Talaba Islam protest last month in Karachi, carrying signs decrying blasphemers and chanting slogans against Asia Bibi, a Christian mother sentenced to death for blasphemy. Politicians and conservative clerics are at odds over whether President Asif Ali Zardari should pardon Asia Bibi, sentenced to hang for defaming the Prophet Muhammad.

It began in the summer of 2009 as a quarrel over water in a sweltering farm field in the province of Punjab. When the heated words were over, Asia Noreen Bibi was charged under the strict blasphemy laws of predominantly Muslim Pakistan.

A Christian wife and mother, the woman commonly known as Asia Bibi was convicted by a district court last month of blaspheming the Prophet Muhammad. The punishment is mandatory death and Asia Bibi became the first female in Pakistan to be sentenced to hang for blasphemy.

</IMG> Asia Bibi at a prison in Sheikhupura, near Lahore, on Nov. 20. She appeared in a televised interview from her prison, tearfully denying the blasphemy charges that led to her death sentence.

Asia Bibi, a Roman Catholic, says she did not commit the crime. The case has drawn international condemnation, and Pope Benedict XVI has called for Asia Bibi's release.

But in a country where conservative religious forces are gathering strength, fundamentalists have called for her head.

At a recent protest after Friday's prayers in Rawalpindi, a small crowd of bearded men chanted: "Asia, the blasphemer: Hang her, hang her."

Such protesters who often eclipse the country's more peaceful majority views are passionate that Pakistan's blasphemy law should not be questioned let alone changed.

The leader of the demonstration, Mohammad Saleem of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Pakistan Party, said: "Our country is Islamic and we are Muslims. We want justice."

Under the law, defiling the Quran merits imprisonment for life. Defaming the sacred name of Muhammad merits death. The penalties were introduced in the 1980s under the dictatorship of General Zia Al Haq, who critics say used the measures to prop up his rule using Islam.
The protesting men pledged to "protect the dignity" of the Prophet and "to sacrifice our lives for Muhammad."

Continued- http://www.npr.org/2010/12/14/132031645/christian-s-death-verdict-spurs-holy-row-in-pakistan?ps=cprs

 

[Meepy]

And this and other nasties, from the religion of peace, huh. I don't believe their Allah has anything to do with God.

My prayers for Asia Bibi and family...for all those living in barbaric countries, and using the name of god to torture maim and kill.

I myself am having a hard time what to think of Islam. There are some Catholics and popes who openly decry it, but then there are issues like when Pope John Paul II kissed the Koran and documents like nostra aetate.

Do any of you think John Paul II made a mistake when he kissed the Koran??

 

[Michie]

(ANS) -- Asia Bibi, the Christian woman who triggered a blasphemy furor in Pakistan and in whose defense Punjab Governor Salman Taseer lost his life, is facing a threat of a suicide attack inside a jail, where she is currently lodged.

According to Z News (www.zeenews.com), the “Moaviya group,” a militant organization plans to mount a suicide attack on Sheikhupura district jail, where 45-year-old Asia is being held, The Express Tribune quoted its sources as saying. An intelligence report issued last week has corroborated threat to her life.

“Punjab police and jail authorities subsequently beefed up security due to the intelligence report and the assassination of Taseer,” said the story.

Continued- http://www.assistnews.net/stories/2011/s11010065.htm