ASIA/PAKISTAN – Expectation for appeal verdict for the murderer of governor Taseer

Monday, 16 February 2015

ASIA/PAKISTAN – Expectation for appeal verdict for the murderer of governor Taseer
Islamabad (Agenzia Fides) – The High Court of Islamabad, after its last hearing suspended judgement regarding the case of Mumtaz Qadri, self-confessed murderer of Salman Taseer, former governor of Punjab. In the first grade Qadri was found guilty and given capital punishment. In the appeal the judges listened to the argumentation of both the prosecution (Punjab Prosecutor’s Office) and the defence.
Fides was informed that Qadri’s lawyers underlined that “Pakistan is a Muslim country”. Qadri decided to kill Taseer “because the latter opposed the country’s Blasphemy Law” and “that in other cases of blasphemers killed for scornful words against the Prophet of Islam, these acts were approved and appreciated”. Therefore “the matter should be entrusted to a Federal Court of Sharia Law” (Islamic Law).
Deputy procurator Mian Abdul Rauf, representing the federal government, said extrajudicial killing is contrary to the country’s Constitution and that Qadri’s crime is known to all : therefore his appeal should be rejected. Having listened to the argumentation of the Court judgement was suspended.
Governor Salman Taseer and minorities Minister Shahbaz Bhatti were murdered in 2011, for defending Mrs Asia Bibi, a Christian woman condemned to death for blasphemy, and for demanding a reform of the blasphemy law . (PA) (Agenzia Fides 16/2/2015


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