LAHORE: Pakistan’s Supreme Court yesterday temporarily suspended the death sentence of a Christian woman accused of blasphemy, her lawyer said, in a case that hit global headlines after the murder of two politicians who tried to intervene on her behalf.
Asia Bibi, a farm worker and mother of four, became the first woman to be sentenced to death under Pakistan’s controversial blasphemy law in 2010.
The SC will soon begin hearing an appeal against her conviction, said lawyer Saif-ul-Malook. “The execution of Asia Bibi has been suspended and will remain suspended until the decision of this appeal,” Malook said. No date had been set for her execution, he added.
The law in predominantly Muslim Pakistan does not define blasphemy but stipulates that the penalty is death.
The governor of Punjab province, Salman Taseer, was shot dead by a bodyguard in 2011 after he had sought a presidential pardon for Bibi. The judge who later sentenced Taseer's killer had to flee the country.
Islamist militants claimed responsibility for the murder later in 2011 of the then sole Christian government minister for challenging the blasphemy law.
The case against Bibi followed accusations by two sisters who accused her of making derogatory remarks about Islam.
Malook said key witnesses had not appeared during hearings by the High Court. Lawyers who hear blasphemy cases are frequently threatened. A prominent human rights advocate defending a professor accused of making a blasphemous Facebook post was murdered last year. Reuters
