Pakistani Christian Sentenced to Death for Hateful Content Against Muslims

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A Pakistani court sentenced a Christian man to death for reportedly sharing what it claimed was hateful content against Muslims on social media after one of the worst mob attacks on Christians in the eastern province of Punjab last year, his lawyer said, adding they will appeal the verdict.

Groups of Muslim men burned down dozens of homes and churches in the city of Jaranwala in the Punjab province in August 2023 after some residents claimed they saw two Christian men tearing out pages from the Quran, the holy book of Islam, throwing them on the ground, and even writing insulting remarks on other pages, according to authorities. The two men were later arrested.

No casualties were reported at the time of the attacks as terrified Christians fled their homes to safer areas. Though police arrested more than 100 suspects following the attacks, it remains unclear if any were convicted.

Ehsan Shan, though not party to the desecration, was accused of reposting the defaced pages of the Quran on his TikTok account, his lawyer Khurram Shahzad said. He also said he would appeal the death sentence handed down to Shan on June 29th by a court in the city of Sahiwal in the Punjab province.

Amir Farooq, a police officer who arrested Shan, said the man shared “the hateful content at a sensitive time when authorities were already struggling to contain the violence.”

Naveed Kashif, a local priest at a church in Sahiwal, said while he didn’t excuse what Shan posted, he wondered “why the court ordered such an extreme verdict when those linked to the attacks are yet to be punished.”

Blasphemy accusations are common in Pakistan, and anyone found guilty of insulting Islam or Islamic religious figures can be sentenced to death under the country’s blasphemy laws. While the Pakistani government has yet to carry out a death sentence for blasphemy, often just the accusation can cause riots and incite mobs to violence, lynchings, and killings. 

Blasphemy accusations are also used to settle personal scores and intimidate religious minorities. 72-year-old Nazir Masih died last June after an angry mob attacked him last May following accusations of blasphemy.

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