Saturday, July 18, 2020

ACN-USA News - Kidnapped Pakistani Catholic girl has been raped and is pregnant


TABASSUM YOUSAF is the lawyer representing the parents of the young Catholic girl, Huma Younus, now aged 15, who was abducted in October 2019 and forced to convert to Islam. Speaking with Aid to the Church in Need (ACN), she gave a dramatic update on the personal and legal situation of this adolescent girl, who was also forced to marry her captor.

Ms. Yousaf reported: “Huma has telephoned her parents, telling them that she has now become pregnant as a result of the sexual violence she has been subjected to. Asked by her father if she could leave her abductor’s house and return to her parents’ home, she told him that she is not allowed to leave the house and that her life has become still more difficult, since she is now imprisoned within the walls of one room.”

The girl’s Muslim abductor, Abdul Jabbar, has a brother by the name of Mukhtiar who is a member of the Rangers, a branch of the security forces. “This man, said Ms. Yousaf, “has contacted Huma’s parents via video telephone calls and threatened them directly, showing them his weapons and telling them he would kill them if ever they should come looking for their daughter. This same man, Mukhtiar, has added in audio messages that even if all the Christians should band together to bring Huma back, he would kill both her parents and anyone who tried to help them.”

On the legal front, Huma’s family lawyer explained that the court of first instance, the Third Judicial Magistrate for Karachi East, had closed the case on the grounds of lack of proof. An appeal has been launched to the same judge to re-examine the documentary proof, and the magistrate thereupon contacted the official public records authority, NADRA, in order to obtain the girl’s birth certificate. The next hearing has been set for July 13, 2020.

The lawyer had already presented two official documents in the course of one of the earlier hearings which prove that she is under age; a sworn statement by her school and her baptismal certificate from her Catholic parish of Saint James in Karachi both clearly state Huma’s date of birth as May 22, 2005. Thus she is 15 and below the marriageable age of 18. This fact renders her marriage to her abductor invalid.

As for the High Court of Sindh province, it is still closed on account of the coronavirus pandemic and will probably not open again until August. Only after this will it be possible to set a date for a hearing before this court.

The lawyer representing Huma’s abductor is doing what he can to gain time, Ms. Yousaf reported, because in three years’ time the girl will be 18 and it is highly likely that the case will then be shelved indefinitely. In theory, the Pakistani Supreme Court, which earlier acquitted Asia Bibi, could examine and rule on this case very rapidly.

Ms. Yousaf said that Islamic radicals in Pakistan prevent the judicial system from having full autonomy. She added that, moreover, when it is a matter of the rights of the religious minorities, there are often long delays, since these cases are considered neither urgent, nor a priority.

With regard to the prevalence of the kind of phenomenon, the ordeal of Huma Younus is all too common. Ms. Yousaf, citing research, stated that, “according to my reading, and based on experience, there are around 2,000 such cases per year, whether reported or not.” 

She continued: “Justice delayed is justice denied, hence every delay in reaching judgment on the rights of religious minorities represents a denial of these rights. The court has delayed and continues to delay justice on behalf of Huma, solely because she is an underage Christian girl.”
“If a similar case were to happen involving an underage Muslim girl, authorities would act immediately. As a lawyer, I am certain that the president of the Pakistani Supreme Court could grant justice to the parents of the girl and to Huma herself. However, at every other lower level of the judicial system justice for minorities will not be possible.”

—Massimiliano Tubani


With picture of Human Younas (Facebook)


Editor’s Notes:

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Directly under the Holy Father, Aid to the Church in Need supports the faithful wherever they are persecuted, oppressed or in pastoral need.  ACN is a Catholic charity - helping to bring Christ to the world through prayer, information and action.

Founded in 1947 by Father Werenfried van Straaten, whom Pope John Paul II named “An Outstanding Apostle of Charity,” the organization is now at work in over 145 countries throughout the world.

The charity undertakes thousands of projects every year including providing transport for clergy and lay Church workers, construction of church buildings, funding for priests and nuns and help to train seminarians. Since the initiative’s launch in 1979, 43 million Aid to the Church in Need Child’s Bibles have been distributed worldwide.

For more information contact Michael Varenne at michael@churchinneed.org or call 718-609-0939 or fax 718-609-0938. Aid to the Church in Need, 725 Leonard Street, PO Box 220384, Brooklyn, NY 11222-0384.  www.churchinneed.org

 

Thursday, July 16, 2020

ACN News Moroccan Christians have to practice their faith in secret




THE MALEKITE rite of Sunni Islam is the state religion of Morocco and authorities do not legally recognize followers of any other religions, except Judaism. The 2012 Moroccan Constitution guarantees freedom of worship but it penalizes conversions to any religions other than Islam. That puts the Christian community in a difficult position, Jawad Elhamidy, president of the Moroccan Association of Rights and Religious Liberties, told Aid to the Church in Need (ACN).

There are two Christian communities in Morocco: foreigners who work and live in the country and Moroccans who converted from Islam to Christianity. Moroccan Christians face a grim situation, because only Christian foreigners enjoy freedom of worship, even though they have no legal status in the eyes of the state. There are an estimated 30,000 foreign residents who are Catholic, while 10,000 are Protestant. The number of Moroccan Christians is an estimated 8,000, though some sources put that number as high as 25,000. Morocco has a population of 34.6 million.

There are some 44 churches in the country, which were built during the French protectorate era (1912-1956), some of which have been turned into meeting halls and municipal headquarters. The government does not give permits to build new churches.

“The penal code holds that all Moroccans are Muslims, so those who convert to Christianity face legal problems, beside threats to their security,” Mr. Elhamidy said, adding that “Moroccan Christians worship in secret house churches to avoid state sanctions or harassment from society.” Moroccans do not worship publicly, because they risk being accused of proselytizing if they engage in public expressions of any religion other than Islam.

Foreign clergy, because of fear of being criminally charged with proselytism, are said to discourage Christian citizens from attending their churches. According to Mr. Elhamidy, Church leaders receive a weekly warning from the authorities not to welcome Moroccans, or they will be held accountable for proselytizing.

“If a Moroccan enters a church, one of two things happens; either a policeman sitting in front of the church arrests him or her, or the cleric in charge of the church asks the person to leave, unless the purpose is tourism,” said Mr. Elhamidy.

Also, the government restricts the distribution of non-Islamic religious materials, as well as Islamic materials it deems are inconsistent with the Maliki-Ashari school of Sunni Islam.
Under Moroccan law, proselytizing or converting to another religion is a criminal offence punishable by six months to three years in prison.

ACN’s 2018 Religious Freedom in the World report cites the European Parliament, which “acknowledges that religious freedom is constitutionally enshrined in Morocco but adds that [Moroccan] “Christians and especially Muslims who converted to Christianity face ‘numerous forms of discrimination’ and ‘are not allowed to set foot in a church.’”[

Some Moroccan Christians are arrested three times a week and subjected to bullying and harassment at the police station. For the most part, they are released after interrogation or after they have been put under pressure to return to Islam; those who refuse face insults and abuse, according to Mr. Elhamidy.

When an allegation of blasphemy is made, it can become very dangerous for Christians in custody; there can be violence, and some Christians are held for several days, and police make threats that spouse and children would be arrested, too.

Mohamed Al Moghany is a Muslim man from Al Hajeb city who converted to Christianity; his employer, gun in hand, threatened to kill him. When he filed a complaint with police, he was told to keep quiet about his conversion and threats were made against his family. Six months later he quarreled with his employer again. He was arrested and sentenced to six months in prison. Meanwhile, his wife was interrogated as well.

“The state considers Christianity to be a danger,” Mr. Elhamidy said referring to his association’s monitoring indications of discrimination in the country’s legislation. Researchers found official language referring to “Christian danger” and “the religious entities that threaten the Moroccan nation”—the danger being Muslims converting to Christianity.

There are some 2,400 Jews living in Morocco, with Judaism enjoying full legal recognition. Authorities treat the Jewish community with respect for two reasons—first because it is economically strong, and, secondly, argues Mr. Elhamidy, the government uses its toleration of Judaism to whitewash the abuses targeting other religious minorities.
According to the 2018-2019 report from the Moroccan Association of Human Rights (AMDH) report, there is ongoing denigration of Shia Islam in the media and in Friday sermons. During Ramadan, a teenage girl eating in public was attacked by a bus driver and several young men were arrested and hit with a fine for smoking in public, incidents reflecting an imposition of a conservative strain of Sunni Islam.
—Engy Magdy

With picture of Jawad Elhamidy (© ACN)


Editor’s Notes:

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Directly under the Holy Father, Aid to the Church in Need supports the faithful wherever they are persecuted, oppressed or in pastoral need.  ACN is a Catholic charity - helping to bring Christ to the world through prayer, information and action.

Founded in 1947 by Father Werenfried van Straaten, whom Pope John Paul II named “An Outstanding Apostle of Charity,” the organization is now at work in over 145 countries throughout the world.

The charity undertakes thousands of projects every year including providing transport for clergy and lay Church workers, construction of church buildings, funding for priests and nuns and help to train seminarians. Since the initiative’s launch in 1979, 43 million Aid to the Church in Need Child’s Bibles have been distributed worldwide.

For more information contact Michael Varenne at michael@churchinneed.org or call 718-609-0939 or fax 718-609-0938. Aid to the Church in Need, 725 Leonard Street, PO Box 220384, Brooklyn, NY 11222-0384.  www.churchinneed.org