Pakistan politician hopes death sentence for blasphemy can be overturned

Manila News.Net
Saturday 20th November, 2010

There have been political rumblings in Pakistan over the death sentence passed on a Christian woman.

The woman, Asia Bibi, was sentenced to hang in Punjab after being accused of insulting the Prophet Mohammed.

Asia Bibi was convicted on evidence she had been asked to fetch water while out working with other women in the fields.

Muslim women labourers objected, saying that as a non-Muslim, she should not touch their water bowl.

Bibi was later arrested by police and prosecuted on a complaint by Muslim women that she made derogatory remarks about the Prophet Mohammed.

A top Pakistan government official has now asked for President Asif Ali Zardari to pardon her.

Punjab governor Salman Taseer has met Bibi in prison and said he would pass on her request for clemency to the president.

He said he would personally ask President Zardari to pardon her on humanitarian grounds.

The controversial blasphemy law has been put in the spotlight by the Bibi case, with rights activists saying it encourages Islamist extremism.

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