Asia Bibi flees Pakistan for new life in Canada
Christian finally reunited with her daughters after being cleared of insulting the Prophet Mohammed
A CHRISTIAN woman who spent years on death row in Pakistan after being falsely accused of blasphemy has been released and flown to Canada to seek asylum and start a new life.
Asia Bibi flew to Ottawa earlier this week, her lawyer said, seven months after she was acquitted of insulting the Prophet Mohammed.
The mother of five had been held in secret, protective custody since October as authorities wrestled with how to send her abroad without angering influential religious hardliners.
Ministers had feared allowing her to claim asylum would provoke another round of protests by hardliners insisting Mrs Bibi, 54, be hanged.
The country was paralysed after she was acquitted, with supporters of the Tehreek-e-labbaik Pakistan (TLP), which was founded to oppose blas- phemy reform, taking to the streets, but the arrest of the party’s leaders in November seemed to have quelled the organisation, and yesterday there was no sign of serious unrest.
Saif-ul-malook, Mrs Bibi’s lawyer, said she arrived in Canada on Tuesday, to be reunited with her daughters who took refuge there in December.
Jeremy Hunt, the Foreign Secretary, said her release was “great news”.
The case highlighted Pakistan’s harsh blasphemy laws which carry a death sentence and are said to be a tool for persecuting religious minorities. Mrs Bibi was first convicted of blasphemy after she quarrelled with two Muslim women while they picked berries in rural Punjab in 2009. It was claimed she insulted the Prophet Mohammed after a row broke out because the women would not drink from a container she had touched.
She was sentenced to death in 2010 but denied ever committing blasphemy. She spent eight years on death row before the case was quashed in the supreme court last October.
Wilson Chowdhry, chairman of the British Pakistani Christian Association, said he had been in daily contact with Mrs Bibi’s husband, Ashiq, and added: “She is unwell and must be treated with utmost care and receive appropriate medical care now she is free.”
Mrs Bibi spent recent months in single rooms in safe houses in Islamabad and Karachi as Pakistan’s government decided how to handle her release.
The blasphemy issue has galvanised hardline Islamist parties in Pakistan.
Salman Taseer, governor of Punjab, was assassinated by his own bodyguard in 2011 for defending Mrs Bibi and criticising misuse of the blasphemy law. The killer, Mumtaz Qadri, was executed, but is still venerated by many.
Minorities minister Shahbaz Bhatti was assassinated later in 2011 after also speaking out for Mrs Bibi.