Source: The Guardian

From Russia to Pakistan by way of the US campaign trail, bigotry and ideas of policing belief need to be confronted

The murder of Salman Taseer was in a literal sense a crime against humanity even if in a legal sense it was just another of the innumerable murders that have disfigured Pakistan in recent decades. He was the governor of the Punjab, who was killed by one of his own bodyguards, Mumtaz Qadri, because he had denounced the dreadful blasphemy laws that have beensuccessively rewritten, widened, and made more stringent under Islamising governments since 1980 so that now people can be executed merely for “using derogatory words in respect of the Holy Prophet”.

On Monday, Qadri was hanged in conditions of secrecy. On Tuesday, vast crowds attended his funeral to demonstrate their support for this murderer’s crime. Nor was this support confined to Pakistan. One of the largest mosques in Birmingham said special prayers for Qadri, describing him as “a martyr”, as did influential preachers in Bradford and Dewsbury. These have been strongly and rightly criticised by other British Muslims, and no doubt represent a minority view, but it is disappointing that there are still some imams who have learned little about mutual tolerance in the 25 years since the Rushdie affair, however much mainstream majority Muslim views have moved on.

The murder of Salman Taseer was a rare, high-profile moment in the struggles around the Pakistani blasphemy laws. He was rich, powerful and well-connected. None of that saved him, but most of the victims are poor and powerless members of minority sects, whether Christian, Hindu, Ahmadiyya or even Shia Muslims. Minorities are 10 times more likely to be the target of these laws than are Sunni Muslims. In 2014, the courts sentenced three people to death, six to life imprisonment, and three to determinate jail terms, all for something that should not be a crime at all. This judicial persecution overlays and legitimises far wider unofficial persecution of minorities. The judge who sentenced Qadri for murder had to flee the country immediately afterwards to save his own life. Nearly two-thirds of Pakistani Muslims support the death penalty for leaving their faith, something that must of course involve blasphemy since it involves a renunciation of Muhammad’s status.

More: