Outcry rises over Afghan Christian convert By Sayed Salahuddin
1 hour, 42 minutes ago
Growing international pressure on Afghanistan to respect the religious freedom of a Christian convert was met in Afghanistan on Friday by a clamor of calls for the man to be executed for denying Islam.
The controversy over 40-year-old Abdur Rahman, whose trial is due to begin next week, threatens to drive a wedge between Afghanistan and Western countries that are ensuring its security and bankrolling its development.
But President Hamid Karzai cannot ignore the views of conservative proponents of Islamic law or appear to bow too readily to outside pressure.
A group of several hundred people, including a former prime minister and religious and former faction leaders, met in Kabul and urged that Rahman be tried under Islamic law, and threatened trouble if the government caved in to Western pressure.
Rahman was detained last week for converting to Christianity and could face the death penalty if he refuses to become a Muslim again, judicial officials say.
Death is the punishment stipulated by sharia, or Islamic law, for apostasy. The Afghan legal system is based on a mix of civil and sharia law.
The case has sparked an outcry in North America and Europe but that appeared only to harden positions in Afghanistan.
Several clerics raised the issue during weekly sermons in Kabul on Friday, and there was little sympathy for Rahman.
"We respect all religions, but we don't go into the British embassy or the American embassy to see what religion they are following," said cleric Enayatullah Baligh at Kabul's main mosque.
"We won't let anyone interfere with our religion, and he should be punished," he said.
The United States wants Afghanistan to show that it respects religious freedom and quickly resolve the case. President George W. Bush has vowed to use U.S. leverage over Afghanistan.
Several other countries with troops in Afghanistan, including Canada, Italy, Germany and Australia, have voiced their concern. Some foreign critics have urged that their troops be withdrawn.
Canada said on Thursday Karzai had pledged that Rahman would not be executed. A presidential spokesman in Kabul declined to comment, but a government minister said a solution could be found.
Analysts say they doubt the man will be executed and his case could hinge on interpretations of the new constitution, which says "no law can be contrary to the sacred religion of Islam."
It also says Afghanistan will abide by international agreements, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which enshrines freedom of religion.
STRUGGLE A "RELIGIOUS DUTY"
Rahman told a preliminary hearing last week he had become a Christian while working for an aid group helping Afghan refugees in Pakistan 15 years ago.
He was detained after his family informed authorities he had converted, apparently following a family dispute involving two daughters, a judicial official said.
Virtually everyone interviewed in a small sample of opinion in several parts of the deeply conservative, Muslim country on Friday said Rahman should be punished.
Religious and political figures meeting at a Kabul hotel said the government should ensure Islamic law is enforced.
The group included former prime minister Ahmad Shah Ahmadzai and a senior Shi'ite cleric who commanded anti-Soviet forces in the 1980s, Asif Mohseni, who said Rahman should be executed.
It said if its demands were ignored, "the Muslim people of Afghanistan would consider struggle their legal and religious duty."
A cleric and member of parliament from Badakhshan province said Rahman should be executed. "It would be better to get no aid or military help from the West for 100 years than accept this affront," said Sadullah Abu Aman.
A prosecutor has raised questions about Rahman's mental state, and a judge said that could be taken into account. Rahman has denied he is mentally unstable. A judge said legal proceedings were expected to begin next week.
(Additional reporting by Yousuf Azimy) |
