ISLAMABAD: The accused in Pakistan’s most infamous blasphemy case has been granted a fresh chance to escape the gallows after the Supreme Court confirmed Friday that next week it will hear Asia Bibi’s appeal against her execution.
Bibi, a Christian mother of five, has been on death row since 2010 in what some activists have called a battle for Pakistan’s soul as the state walks a sharp line between upholding human rights and appeasing populist hard-liners.
“The Supreme Court of Pakistan under the chair of Justice Saqib Nisar will hear Asia Bibi’s appeal against her death sentence on Thursday, October 13 in the Supreme Court of Pakistan, Islamabad,” her lawyer Saif-ul-Mulook told AFP.
“I am very hopeful and confident that my client will get justice... and she will be able to spend her life with her children.”
The court confirmed Friday that the date had been set.
Blasphemy is a hugely sensitive issue in deeply conservative, Muslim-majority Pakistan. Anyone even accused of insulting Islam risks a violent and bloody death at the hands of vigilantes.
Rights groups complain the controversial legislation is often abused to carry out personal vendettas, mainly against minority Christians.
Bibi was convicted and sentenced to hang in 2010 after an argument with a Muslim woman over a bowl of water. Her supporters maintain her innocence and insist it was a personal dispute.
Supporters of Mumtaz Qadri, who assassinated provincial governor Salmaan Taseer after he advocated for Bibi in 2011, regularly call for her hanging.
A decision by the court in her favor would “send a powerful message to the world that Pakistan respects the rule of law and not the mob,” Mustafa Qadri, an expert on human rights in South Asia, told AFP recently.
He also predicted that supporters of the assassin Qadri would react violently to such a decision. The Islamist was hung earlier this year, bringing hard-liners into the streets chanting slogans against Bibi, although they dispersed after several days.
Islamabad sets date for Bibi’s blasphemy appeal
Islamabad sets date for Bibi’s blasphemy appeal
France to open consulate in Greenland in February
- The comments came on the day that Denmark’s top diplomat is to meet senior US officials at the White House for talks over Greenland
PARIS: France will open a consulate in Greenland on February 6, the foreign minister said Wednesday, calling the move a “political signal” over the strategic Danish territory, which US President Donald Trump has vowed to seize.
The comments came on the day that Denmark’s top diplomat is to meet senior US officials at the White House for talks over the future of vast, mineral-rich Arctic island.
Since returning to office nearly a year ago, Trump has repeatedly mused about taking over Greenland from longtime ally and European Union member Denmark.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot told French RTL broadcaster that the decision to open the consulate was taken last summer, when President Emmanuel Macron visited Greenland in a show of support.
“For my part, I went there at the end of August to plan the consulate, which will open on February 6,” he said.
“It’s a political signal that’s associated with a desire to be more present in Greenland, including in the scientific field.”
“Greenland does not want to be owned, governed... or integrated into the United States. Greenland has made the choice of Denmark, NATO, (European) Union,” he said.
Greenland’s leader has said that the island would choose to remain an autonomous territory of Denmark over the United States.
Trump has said the United States needs Greenland due to the threat of a takeover by Russia or China.
The two rival powers have both stepped up activity in the Arctic, where ice is melting due to climate change, but neither claims Greenland, where the United States has long had a military base.
