By Farahnaz Ispahani and Nina
Shea, Special to CNN
Editor’s
note: Farahnaz Ispahani is a former member of the Pakistani parliament and
Public Policy Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center 2013-2014. Her forthcoming
book is 'Waiting to Die: Pakistan's religious minorities'. Nina Shea is a
senior fellow, director of the Hudson Institute’s Center for Religious Freedom
and co- author of 'Silenced; How apostasy and blasphemy codes are choking
freedom worldwide'. The views expressed are their own.
The decision to award Malala Yousafzai
the Nobel Peace Prize last week was a good one. After all, the 17 year-old, who was named a joint winner with along withKailash Satyarthi, personifies the struggle for modernity, women’s equality and
individual rights to religious freedom against the threat of Islamic extremism.
But while Malala’s award is a triumph for her determination, it is far from
clear that the cause she champions will meet as much success.
The reality is that Pakistan is facing
a serious problem, with the mushrooming of Islamist appeal within Pakistani
society reminding us that we risk seeing the Talibanization not simply of a
small minority of ordinary citizens, but large swathes of the populace of the
world’s second largest – and only nuclear-armed – Muslim country.
Pakistan abounds with violent sectarian
and Islamist groups headquartered in semiautonomous tribal areas. Foreign
jihadists, including Westerners like American David Headley,
flock to areas such as North Waziristan. Yet although Islamabad devotes a full
third of its armed forces to the northwest of the country, it is also pursuing
policies that encourage a mainstream slide toward extremism.
State laws and practices relating to
Islamic blasphemy, in particular, are increasingly suppressing moderate voices,
while allowing extremists to dominate cultural discourse and learning. As a
result, extremism is making ideological inroads into wider and wider segments
of the population.
A shocking example came last month with
the drive-by shooting of Muhammad Shakeel
Auj, dean of Islamic Studies at the venerable Karachi
University. Auj had earned a PhD after writing a comparison of eight Urdu
translations of the Quran. But some found offense in his “liberal” religious
views as he passionately denounced terrorism and suggested that Muslim women
could pray wearing lipstick and could marry non-Muslims.
Over the past two years, Auj has been
subject to a barrage of blasphemy accusations, fatwas, and death threats, including
that he will be beheaded. Particularly troubling is that four of his own
faculty members were allegedly behind some of the threats. They were arrested,
but soon released on bail. As one obituary writer commented,
Auj’s murder shows that now “even the most mainstream Sunni voices will not be
tolerated.”
Junaid Hafeez, another university
professor, may soon be sentenced to death by the
state. Charged with insulting the Prophet Mohammed on Facebook,
he is now on trial for the capital crime of blasphemy. Yet the charge is based
entirely on oral testimony of students linked to the hardline Jamaat-i-Islami
party.
Hafeez has reportedly found it
difficult to find a lawyer willing to defend him, not least because those who
manage to secure an acquittal for accused blasphemers run the risk of being
seen as blasphemers themselves. And while the state doesn’t penalize such
defense lawyers, it also does little to protect them or punish their
extrajudicial killers either. For example, while after his first two lawyers
quit following death threats, Hafeez was able to hire Rashid Rehman, a senior
lawyer with Pakistan’s Human Rights Commission. But on May 7, Rehman was shot dead in his office.
His killers remain at large.
Liberal Muslim educators, lawyers, and
human rights activists aren’t the only victims of the country’s anti-blasphemy
codes. Often targeted are the Ahmadis, an as many as 5 million strong,
well-educated community that professes faith in Islam, but which is not deemed
Muslim under Pakistan’s constitution. The sect’s tenets renounce violent jihad
and embrace the separation of mosque and state, as well as religious pluralism.
They now account for 40 percent of blasphemy prosecutions, which also
disproportionately target Christians, Shia, and Hindus.
Such extremism has touched us
personally. Our friends Shahbaz Bhatti, the former Minority Affairs Minister,
and Salman Taseer, Punjab’s former governor, were both outspoken critics of the
blasphemy conviction of Christian mother Asia Bibi, and both were gunned down
in 2011. The Lahore High Court on Thursday upheld the death sentence against Asia
Bibi.
The blasphemy law was originally
introduced to appease extremists, but has instead stimulated an appetite for
more. As Bhatti noted: “This law is creating disharmony and intolerance in our
society.” He is right – it legitimizes and enflames religious passions over
speech, while providing extremists a platform within the very heart of
Pakistani society.
American drones are now aiming at
Pakistan’s northwest terrorist snake pit. But there is no military solution to
the blasphemy law. And while it is only right that we celebrate Malala’s Nobel
award, we also cannot forget the growing numbers of Pakistanis that take no
pride in such an achievement.
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