Pakistan in Media

Sometimes we are asked to believe the truly incredible. This time we are told a young Christian man, aged 18 or 19 years, hanged himself to death in his cell using the cord of his shalwar attached to the latch of his cell door. Anyone with half an iota of common sense would realize it is extremely hard, indeed almost impossible, to accomplish such a feat. Hanging is no easy matter. Doing so from a small attachment fixed to a vertical surface even harder. We have not been told either why he should have chosen to take his own life. But the police officials who claim the teenager committed suicide, a day after being sent to the Sialkot jail on judicial remand following charges of blasphemy, obviously lack both brains and morality. It seems quite apparent that the boy was killed. The failure to penalize those responsible for the murder in their jail cells of people who may not have committed any crime has been directly responsible for this latest death, claiming the life of a youngster from an impoverished family whose sufferings will increase as a result of this tragedy. The Christian community in Sialkot, Lahore and other towns has been protesting. Shops have been burnt, property attacked. The relatives of Robert Masih say he was tortured to death. For the moment their tale, for all its horror, seems entirely plausible. The official explanation does not. The record of our police does nothing to persuade us that they are telling the truth. This is all the more true given the victim was a non-Muslim and as such, in the grotesquely distorted society we have become, more liable to suffer such abuse.

The blasphemy pretext, even though it was entirely unproven, has been used to take away another life. It is becoming hard to keep track of how many needless deaths have been caused by those bandying about the blasphemy charge and then acting as judge, jury and executioner. It has to be said, for the umpteenth time, that the simple fact that we are all humans demands that the blasphemy laws be reviewed to discourage such barbarity. The minister for minorities has promised a transparent probe into the latest death. He would do well to also set up a body to determine what can be done to prevent further mayhem. So far the government has only reacted to the spate of recent incidents that have taken place. Will this new outrage prompt the government to take more proactive measures to prevent the abuse of minorities and to tackle the bigotry that underpins it?
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