Lahore: A Pakistani man from the minority Shia community has been sentenced to death by a court in Punjab province for defaming Islam, officials said on Wednesday.
“Additional Sessions Judge (Faisalabad) Rana Sohail Tariq handed down the death sentence to suspect Wasim Abbas on the charges of insulting the Prophet. The court also imposed a fine of PKR 500,000 (over USD 2,820). In case of failure to pay the fine the convict will have to undergo two years imprisonment,” a court official said.
Abbas was arrested by the Factory Area police in Faisalabad, 180 km from provincial capital Lahore, in June 2020 after a complaint was lodged against him for allegedly insulting the Prophet and his companions.
In the last few months, a Sri Lankan national and a mentally challenged man were brutally killed by a mob in Punjab province over allegations of blasphemy.
Pakistan has extremely strict blasphemy laws against defaming Islam, including the death penalty, and rights campaigners say they are often used to settle scores in the Muslim majority country.
In June 2017, an anti-terrorism court in Pakistan has sentenced a man to death for allegedly committing blasphemy on Facebook. A court in Bahawalpur handed out the verdict, the harshest yet for such a crime, after finding Taimoor Raza, 30, guilty of insulting the prophet Muhammad. Raza was arrested in 2016, after a debate about Islam on Facebook with a man who turned out to be a counter-terrorism agent. He was one among 15 people arrested by the counter-terrorism department last year, accused of blasphemy, according to the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan.
Raza’s brother, Waseem Abbas, said the family was “poor but literate”, and belonged to Pakistan’s minority Shia Muslim community. “My brother indulged in a sectarian debate on Facebook with a person, who we later come to know, was a [counter-terrorism department] official with the name of Muhammad Usman,” he said.
An Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC) in January 2021, sentenced three men to death for sharing blasphemous content on social media. A fourth accused in the same case was sentenced to 10 years imprisonment.
The ATC also issued perpetual arrest warrants for four accused, absconding in the case.
According to the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), which had investigated the case, Rana Nouman Rafaqat and Abdul Waheed operated fake profiles and disseminated blasphemous material on social media, while Nasir Ahmad had uploaded blasphemous videos to a Youtube channel.