Commission on Human Rights to acknowledge the persecution of converts in several Islamic countries such as Pakistan. Barnabas Fund, which investigates the plight of suffering Christians, said the panel made its appeal this month in Geneva, Switzerland, during a U.N. meeting discussing religious persecution.
The organization said the group included Ibn Warraq, a secularist Muslim and author of the book Leaving Islam: Apostates Speak Out and Dr Younas Sheikh, another secularist Muslim intellectual who was freed in November 2003 after spending three years in prison in Pakistan "under a bogus accusation of blasphemy" of which two and a half years on death row. They were joined by Shafique Keshavjee, a Swiss Protestant pastor and author and Paul Cook, Advocacy Manager for Barnabas Fund.
The U.N. must "urgently review the cases of all those currently charged or convicted of blasphemy" and to "replace the blasphemy laws by laws which respect the human rights of individuals in conformity with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights", said Muslim secularist Sheikh, according to a transcript released by Barnabas Fund.
Pastor Keshavjee stressed that the Special Rapporteur of the Commission, who has proposed to examine racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance, must also investigate "reports from areas across the world where leaving a religion can lead to persecution." Cook added that the U.N. Commission on Human Rights should issue a "public condemnation" of the persecution of converts and a similar "public encouragement to Muslim religious leaders to publicly condemn the persecution of converts and to denounce it as something unworthy of the Islamic faith."
PRISON AND TORTURE
In several countries of the world, former Muslims who became Christians, have been imprisoned and even tortured. There is also concern about a rise of Muslim extremism, at a time when Washington has brought the war on terrorism to the heartland of the Islamic world, in areas such as Iraq and Afghanistan. In Egypt for instance, Coptic girls have been kidnapped and forced to give up their faith in Christ, human rights groups say.
The panel speaking at the Palais des Nations in Geneva on April 7 acknowledged that there was prejudice and discrimination faced by many converts in the Buddhist, Christian, Jewish and Hindu traditions "drawing particular attention to problems in Eritrea, India and Sri Lanka,"
"However, of all the major world faiths it is in conservative Islamic societies that converts face the greatest persecution in the world today."
DEATH PENALTY
Muslim author Warraq was quoted as saying that "under Muslim law, the male apostate must be put to death, as long as he is an adult, and in full possession of his faculties."
Barnabas Fund official Cook added that "other punishments prescribed by the Shari’ah include the annulment of marriage, the removal of children and the loss of all property and inheritance rights. This tradition is still upheld and taught by most Muslim religious leaders around the world today," he said, according to a transcript.
The members of the panel "were united" in their calls "for further action by the U.N. Commission on Human Rights, national governments and political and religious leaders to do more to support the rights of converts," Barnabas Fund added.
