Pakistan: Law Repeal Unlikely

Despite international criticism, it appears unlikely that Pakistan will amend or repeal its controversial blasphemy laws. The laws impose severe penalties, including the possibility of a death sentence, on those found guilty of insulting Islam. In 2010, Christian Asia Bibi became the first person to receive a death sentence under these laws, for her alleged blasphemy of the prophet Muhammad. Asia Bibi remains in prison while her sentence is under appeal.

Asia Bibi

Christians, who compose less than 3 percent of Pakistan’s population of 150 million, have long complained about the blasphemy laws. They say the laws provide no protection to members of religious minority groups who are accused by Muslims of violations such as tearing a page from the Quran. Such accusations are commonly used to settle scores between feuding neighbors. The accused have little hope of defending themselves because the charge of blasphemy by a Muslim usually serves as sufficient evidence of the crime.

Former President Musharraf tried to reform the law in 2000, but he dropped the issue after Islamic religious parties protested the move. In 2007, Pakistani Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed promised that the law would be changed after that year’s general election, but they remain in place today.

Salmaan Taseer

The blasphemy laws continue to be controversial in Pakistan’s divided society. When the reform issue gained worldwide attention in 2010–2011 after Asia Bibi’s sentencing, Islamist political parties launched a campaign demanding that the laws be left unchanged. In addition, clerics declared that those trying to change the law were themselves guilty of blasphemy. In January, Salman Taseer, governor of Pakistan’s most populous province, Punjab, was killed by his bodyguard after publicly seeking Asia Bibi’s pardon. And on March 2, Pakistan’s only Christian government minister, Shahbaz Bhatti, was killed by extremists because of his opposition to the laws.

Pakistan’s president and prime minister both condemned Bhatti’s murder, but they said nothing about revising or repealing the blasphemy laws. After Gov. Taseer’s death, a prominent lawmaker in the ruling political party dropped her initiative to have the laws amended. She had received death threats and lacked support in her party.

Each year since 2002, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom has recommended that Pakistan be named a “country of particular concern,” which would allow the U.S. government to take steps, including sanctions, against Pakistan for violating religious freedoms. The State Department has overruled the recommendation each year.