 A Christian family’s home in Pakistan, burned by rampaging Muslims |
Mobs have been lynching and murdering innocent people and looting and burning homes and businesses because of false claims of blasphemy, and it needs to stop, a new petition is demanding of the United Nations.
The European Center for Law and Justice has filed a petition with the U.N.’s special rapporteurs seeking prosecutions in Pakistan for those responsible for the attacks and killings of Christians.
“We have expressed in the strongest terms possible that the Pakistani government must prosecute acts of violence based upon religion,” said Jay Sekulow, chief counsel for the organization, as well as the U.S.-based American Center for Law and Justice.
“Christians are being singled out and murdered because of their faith. Only when the Pakistani government effectively prosecutes those responsible for the acts of violence will attacks against Christians end,” he said.
WND reported just days ago on Muslims torching 50 homes and a church and murdering Christians in the Pakistani city of Gojra.
 Burned, looted home in Korian village (Centre for Legal Aid Assistance and Settlement) |
A report from the Centre for Legal Aid Assistance and Settlement, or CLAAS, said the assault happened during a protest by thousands of Muslim Islamists, including members of banned militant groups.
According to Compass Direct News, more than 500 Islamic extremists looted and set fire to another 60 homes in response to the same rumor of desecration of the Quran only two days earlier in the village of Korian.
Authorities said the violence erupted even though there was no proof that “blasphemy” took place.
“The ‘blasphemy laws’ that encourage the Muslim-on-Christian violence are not only abhorrent but violate the principle of the universality of religious freedom, which is proclaimed to be an international human rights standard by Pakistan itself,” Sekulow said.
The ECLJ is seeking for the U.N. to call on Pakistan to prosecute those guilty of the deadly attacks on Christians, which have claimed the lives of at least 60 Christians in recent years.
“Pakistan has expressed its deep concern about discrimination, violence, and negative media reports directed at Muslims, and enforcement of laws that target Muslim minorities after September 11,” said a summary of the petition.
“It asserts that ‘Islam is frequently and wrongly associated with human rights violations.’ It ‘strongly deplores all acts of … physical violence and assaults … against persons on the basis of their religion…’ However, Pakistan has not given the same protections to its Christian minorities that it expects other nations to provide to Muslims.”
“Pakistani authorities may not stand by and allow mob lynching, murder, looting, and destruction to take the place of police procedure,” the petition said.
The petition continues: “More than two decades of blasphemy laws have taught Pakistani Muslims that the punishment for allegedly insulting Islam is death. The Pakistani government must repeal or procedurally change blasphemy laws.”
The ECLJ has posted the petition online.
The ECLJ is an international firm that focuses on protecting human rights and religious freedom in Europe and worldwide. It has handled a number of cases before the European Court of Human Rights and has been designated as special Consultative Status with the United Nations.
It reported just a month ago when a false rumor of desecration of a Quran, which is punishable under Pakistani law, sparked attacks by “mobs of thousands of religiously-motivated Muslims.”
“Mobsters equipped with automatic weapons looted and set fire to at least 50 homes and a church in Christian Town, Gojra,” the petition cited.
“At least seven charred bodies of Pakistani Christian men, women and children who had been burned alive were found in the rubble. The authorities did not file any charges against the assailants until after the Christians protested by not burying the ones who died in the attack.”
Just weeks before that, a Muslim mob looted and destroyed the homes of about 135 Christian families, ECLJ said.
“No one was arrested or prosecuted,” the report said.
WND also recently reported Muslims attacked fleeing Christians with acid because a Christian man driving a tractor reportedly tried to pass a Muslim on a motorcycle.
Barnabas Aid reported that the July violence happened in the village of Bahmani Walla in Punjab state in Pakistan, which is dominated by Islamic influences.
The report said 600 Muslims used gasoline
bombs to vandalize 117 homes belonging to Christians – including 48 damaged by fire, and sabotage water pumps and cut electricity.
“The most disturbing development was the throwing of acid at the Christians as they fled. At least nine women and four children have been injured,” the Christian ministry reported.
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