Worksafe’s hotel quarantine breach penalties are a warning for other employers to keep workers safe from COVID

Alex Collie, Monash UniversityVictoria’s occupational health and safety regulator, Worksafe, has charged the state’s health department with 58 breaches for failing to provide hotel quarantine staff with a safe workplace.

The breaches occurred between March and July 2020, and at up to A$1.64 million per breach, could amount to fines of $95 million.

This should serve as a warning to all employers to start assessing their workers’ safety against COVID and how they can mitigate these risks, ahead of the nation reopening.

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Remind me, what is Worksafe?

States and territories have responsibility for enforcing laws designed to keep people safe at work: occupational health and safety (OHS) laws.

Worksafe Victoria is responsible for and regulates OHS in Victoria. It’s responsible for making sure employers and workers comply with OHS laws; and it provides information, advice and support.

Victoria’s parliament has given Worksafe the power to prosecute employers if they breach OHS laws. In 2018-19, it commenced 157 prosecutions which resulted in nearly A$7 million in fines.

Unlike some other state OHS regulators, Worksafe also manages the Victorian workers’ compensation system.

Why did Worksafe charge the health department?

Worksafe charged Victoria’s Department of Health with 58 breaches of sections 21 and 23 of the Victorian Occupational Health and Safety Act.

The Act requires employers to maintain a working environment that is “safe and without risks to health” of employees. These obligations extend to independent contractors or people employed by those contractors.

Worksafe is alleging that in operating the Victorian COVID-19 quarantine hotels between March and July 2020, the Department of Health failed to maintain a working environment that was safe and limited risks to health, both to its own employees and to other people working in the hotels.

Essentially Worksafe is stating that through a series of failures, the department placed government employees and other workers at risk of serious illness or death through contracting COVID-19 at work.

Worksafe alleges the Victorian health department failed to:

• appoint people with expertise in infection control to work at the quarantine hotels
• provide sufficient infection prevention and control training to security guards working in the hotels, as evidence shows training can improve employees’ safety practices
• provide instructions, at least initially, on how to use personal protective equipment, and later did not update instructions on mask wearing in some of the quarantine hotels.

Worksafe undertook a 15-month long investigation, beginning in about July 2020. It’s possible the trigger for this investigation was a referral from the Coate inquiry into hotel quarantine, but that has not been stated.

Is it unusual for a government regulator to fine a government department?

It’s not that unusual. Government departments are subject to the same OHS laws as other employers in the state, and so Worksafe’s powers extend to them as well.

In the past few years, Worksafe has successfully prosecuted the Department of Justice, Parks Victoria and the Department of Health, resulting in fines and convictions.

In 2018, for example, Worksafe prosecuted Corrections Victoria (part of the Department of Justice) after a riot at the Metropolitan Remand Centre in 2015 that put the health and safety of staff at risk.

The riot occurred after the introduction of a smoking ban in prisons. Worksafe considered prisoner unrest was predictable and its impact on staff could have been reduced by having additional security in place in the days leading up to the smoking ban.

In that case the Department of Justice pleaded guilty and was convicted and fined A$300,000 plus legal costs.

What does this mean for other employers?

This case highlights that employers have obligations to provide safe working environments for their staff, and other people in their workplaces. This extends to reducing risks of COVID-19 infection.

These obligations don’t just apply to government departments. They apply to every employer in the state.

Employers should ensure they have appropriate systems and policies in place to reduce COVID-19 infection risk to their staff. This includes, where appropriate, physical distancing, working from home, wearing personal protective equipment (PPE), good hygiene practices, workplace ventilation, and so on.

Employers should consider the risks unique to their environment and address them appropriately, in advance of the nation reopening when we reach high levels of COVID vaccination coverage.

Some employers in high-risk settings – such as health care, retail and hospitality – will need to do more to protect their workers than others.

What happens next for the Vic health department?

The case has been filed in the Magistrates court, with an initial hearing date set for October 22. It will progress through the court system from there. Most prosecutions are heard in the Magistrates Court although some proceed to the County Court.

If the Department of Health pleads guilty, the courts will determine if a fine should be paid and how much. The court may also determine if a conviction is recorded.

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Alex Collie, Professor and ARC Future Fellow, Monash University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Can Australian employers make you get a COVID-19 vaccine? Mostly not — but here’s when they can

Onchira Wongsiri/Shutterstock

Joo-Cheong Tham, The University of MelbourneAustralia’s official policy on vaccines is that they be voluntary and free. But the federal government hasn’t shut the door completely on employers pursuing mandatory policies of their own.

Last week the federal government reiterated it won’t use its powers to give employers a free hand to mandate vaccines. Yet Prime Minister Scott Morrison also said:

Decisions to require COVID-19 vaccinations for employees will be a matter for individual business, taking into account their particular circumstances and their obligations under safety, anti-discrimination and privacy laws.

So far just two Australian companies — regional air carrier Alliance Airlines and canning company SPC — have declared they will make a COVID-19 vaccination mandatory for their workers.

The reason so few have declared such intentions is because the law isn’t on the employer’s side. There are only limited circumstances where workplace vaccine mandates are likely to be found lawful.

Mandatory vaccines are an exception, not the rule

Safe Work Australia, the federal work health and safety regulator, and the Fair Work Ombudsman, the agency responsible for compliance with federal workplace laws, have both made it clear that most employers can’t make you get a vaccine.

Safe Work Australia’s guidance says “most employers will not need to make vaccination mandatory” to meet their workplace, health and safety obligations.

The exceptions are when public health directions require them to do so. Examples are the New South Wales health order requiring specified classes of quarantine facility, transport and airport workers to have had at least one vaccine shot, and the Queensland order that health service employees in residential aged care be fully vaccinated by October 31.

The Fair Work Ombudsman says an employer needs to have a compelling reason before requiring vaccination of workers. Two conditions stand out:

1. Employees must interact with people with an elevated risk of being infected with coronavirus. For example, if they work in hotel quarantine or border control.
2. Employees must have close contact with people who are most vulnerable to the health impacts catching COVID. For example, if they work in aged care.

This second condition aligns with rulings in unfair dismissal cases involving employees refusing influenza vaccinations. In three such cases this year, the Fair Work Commission (Australia’s federal industrial tribunal) said it was reasonable for employers in the aged care and child care sectors to insist on vaccination as a condition of employment.

But overall, the Fair Work Ombudsman said:

In the current circumstances, the overwhelming majority of employers should assume that they can’t require their employees to be vaccinated against coronavirus.

Trampling on worker rights

This legal context could, of course, be changed by the federal parliament amending the Fair Work Act to expressly authorise employer mandates.

Given the composition of the senate, this might prove impossible to achieve. But even if it were possible, there are good reasons to oppose it — even while acknowledging the clear public health benefit of COVID-19 vaccinations.

At stake are fundamental principles of worker rights. In the words of the International Labour Organisation’s 1944 Declaration of Phildelphia, workers have the right to “pursue both their material well-being and their spiritual development in conditions of freedom and dignity”.

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Any decision to limit fundamental rights is best done through accountable public institutions, rather than private entities motivated by commercial considerations.

Public health orders give the community confidence that such decisions have been informed by expert advice, and that different stakeholders have had a chance to be heard (as employer groups and unions have had with the federal vaccine roll-out).

Opening a can of worms

Unions and employer groups largely agree that, in the limited situations where there are workplace vaccine mandates, they should be backed by public health orders.

Business Council of Australia chief executive Jennifer Westacott says vaccination should be “driven as much as possible through public health orders, not left to individual employers”.

Australian Council of Trade Unions secretary Sally McManus says any mandate “has to be based on the advice of health professionals, not just made up by employers, and workers must be consulted, along with their union”.

Consultation does not appear to have been a feature of the announcements by Alliance Airlines or SPC, whose workers reportedly learnt of the company’s decision through the media.

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Other companies may be waiting to see the upshot — whether those policies lead to challenges either through the Fair Work Commission, which arbitrates unfair dismissal claims, or through federal courts for breach of workplace laws.

But most — from big employers such as Wesfarmers and Commonwealth Bank to boutique outfits such as Atlassian — will not be waiting. Their emphasis is on carrots, not sticks, for driving up vaccination rates.

If you find yourself out of step with both the Australian Council of Trade Unions and the Business Council of Australia, it’s a sign you are out on a legal limb, and need to consult an industrial lawyer.

Joo-Cheong Tham, Professor, Melbourne Law School, The University of Melbourne

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

What employers need to know: the legal risk of asking staff to work in smokey air

Elizabeth Shi, RMIT University

Amid thick bushfire smoke in cities including Canberra and Melbourne, employers need to consider their legal obligations.

Some have directed their workers not to turn up in order to avoid to occupational health and safety risks. Among them is the Commonwealth department of home affairs which last week asked most of its staff to stay away from its Canberra headquarters for 48 hours.

Other employers want to know where they stand.

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Each state and territory has its own occupational health and safety laws.
However most line up with the so-called Model Act, a federal act of parliament intended to harmonise state laws.

Under section 17 it imposes on employers a duty to, so far as is reasonably practicable, ensure health and safety by eliminating or minimising risks.

This employer’s duty applies not only to its employees, but also to other types of workers including independent contractors.

Meaning of ‘reasonably practical”

Under the section 18 of the Model Act, “reasonably practicable” means

that which is, or was at a particular time, reasonably able to be done in relation to ensuring health and safety, taking into account and weighing up all relevant matters

By themselves, these words aren’t much of a guide, so the Act includes examples of “relevant matters”, among them:

• the likelihood of a hazard or risk occurring

• the degree of harm that might result

• what the employer knows or ought reasonably know about the hazard or risk, and ways of eliminating or minimising hazard or risk

• the availability and suitability of ways to eliminate or reduce hazard or risk

• the cost associated with available ways of eliminating or minimising the risk, including whether the cost is grossly disproportionate to the risk

Meaning of ‘likelihood’

Employers should make themselves aware of the risk of an air quality hazard.
This can be achieved by checking the most up to date air quality index in the location on an environment protection authority website:

NSW

Victoria

Queensland

South Australia

Western Australia

Tasmania

Northern Territory

Australian Capital Territory

Workers who work outdoors are more likely to be subject to harmful effects of bushfire smoke than indoor workers.

They are more likely to experience irritation to their airways, nose and eyes.

They might also experience low visibility which might make their work more dangerous.

The machines they operate could also be impacted by the smoke and dust in a way which would make operating them more dangerous.

Special measures should be taken to protect workers who work outdoors, such as providing them with face masks or rescheduling their work.

Smoke emissions from the Australian bushfires from 1 December 2019 to 4 January 2020.

Meaning of ‘degree of harm’

Asthma suffers might be at greater risk.

It is certainly arguable the likelihood of harm for indoor workers is much lower, especially if the air quality in their workplace is the same or even better than the air quality in their homes.

Employers should have up-to-date information about the health of their workers, especially those workers who have pre-existing conditions that might predispose them to harm from smoke.

Among these would be workers who have asthma or other respiratory disorders.

Special steps should be taken to protect them, taking into account their pre-existing conditions.

Meaning of ‘reasonably ought to know’

Employers should be checking up-to-date information on an environment protection authority website and on the website of Safe Work Australia which is the Commonwealth regulator for occupational health and safety laws.

It’s very likely law enforcers will presume the information on these websites constitute information the employer ought to have known in determining the appropriate action to take.

For example, it would be difficult for an employer to argue they didn’t know P2 rated face masks should be provided to workers when the Safe Work Australia website specifically mentions them as an appropriate way of eliminating or reducing air quality hazards.

Meaning of ‘availability of ways to reduce risk’

Safe Work Australia directs employers to have in place measures to manage the risks to health and safety of working outdoors when air quality is reduced, including:

• working indoors (where possible)

• rescheduling outdoor work until conditions improve

• ensuring buildings and equipment are functioning correctly and have not been affected by dust or debris

• cleaning dust and debris off outdoor surfaces

• providing personal protective equipment such as eye protection and correctly fitted P2-rated face masks.

Meaning of ‘cost of minimising hazard’

The cost of elimination or minimising hazard will be higher for some measures than others.

For example, it might cost more to direct workers to stay home than to provide face masks.

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These costs need to be weighed up against the likelihood and degree of potential harm.

If the likelihood and degree of harm is high, it’s unlikely law enforcers will be particularly sympathetic to arguments about cost.

Elizabeth Shi, Senior Lecturer, Graduate School of Business and Law, RMIT University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Muslims Order Christians to Leave Village in Pakistan

Christians drew wrath by objecting to sexual assaults on girls and women.

KHANEWAL, Pakistan, June 7 (CDN) — The head of a Muslim village last week ordered 250 Christian families to leave their homes in Khanewal district, Punjab Province, local residents said.

Abdul Sattar Khan, head of village No. 123/10R, Katcha Khoh, and other area Muslim residents ordered the expulsions after Christian residents objected too strenuously to sexual assaults by Muslims on Christian girls and women, said a locally elected Christian official, Emmanuel Masih.

Most of the village’s Christian men work in the fields of Muslim land owners, while most of the Christian women and girls work as servants in the homes of Muslim families, said Rasheed Masih, a Christian in the village who added that the impoverished Christians were living in appalling conditions.

The Muslim employers have used their positions of power to routinely sexually assault the Christian women and girls, whose complaints grew so shrill that four Christian men – Emmanuel Masih, Rasheed Masih, his younger brother Shehzad Anjum and Yousaf Masih Khokhar – sternly confronted the Muslims, only to be told that all Christians were to leave the village at once.

“The Muslim villagers came to us with the expulsion order only after Christian women and girls raised a hue and cry when they became totally exasperated because they were sexually attacked or forced to commit adultery by Muslims on a daily basis,” said Khokhar, a Christian political leader.

Khokhar said the unanimous decision to compel the Christians to leave their homes and relocate them was possible because the Christians were completely subject to the Muslims’ power.

“The Muslims had been telling the Christian women and girls that if they denied them sex, they would kick them out of their native village,” Emmanuel Masih added.

Christians created the colony when they began settling in the area in about 1950, said Anjum. Since then the migration of Muslims to the area has left the Christians a minority among the 6,000 residents of the village, said Emmanuel Masih.

“There is no church building or any worship place for Christians, and neither is there any burial place for Christians,” Emmanuel Masih said.

He said that the Rev. Pervez Qaiser of village No. 231, the Rev. Frank Masih of village No. 133 and the Rev. Sharif Masih of village No. 36, Mian Channu, have been visiting the village on Sundays to lead services at the houses of the Christian villagers, who open their homes by turns.

Asked why they didn’t contact local Katcha Khoh police for help, Emmanuel Masih and Khokhar said that filing a complaint against Muslim village head Khan and other Muslims would only result in police registering false charges against them under Pakistan’s notorious “blasphemy” statutes.

“They might arrest us,” Khokhar said, “and the situation would be worse for the Christian villagers who are already living a deplorably pathetic life under the shadow of fear and death, as they [the Muslims] would not be in police lock-up or would be out on bail, due to their riches and influence, very soon.”

 

Couples Charged with ‘Blasphemy’

That very fate befell two Christian couples in Gulshan-e-Iqbal town, Karachi, who had approached police with complaints against Muslims for falsely accusing them of blasphemy.

On May 28, a judge directed Peer Ilahi Bakhsh (PIB) police to file charges of desecrating the Quran against Atiq Joseph and Qaiser William after a mob of armed Islamists went through their home’s garbage looking for pages of the Islamic scripture among clean-up debris (see “Pakistani Islamists Keep Two Newlywed Couples from Home,” May 27).

Additional District & Sessions Judge Karachi East (Sharqi) Judge Sadiq Hussein directed the PIB police station in Gulshan-e-Iqbal to file a case against Joseph and William, newlyweds who along with their wives had shared a rented home and are now in hiding. The judge acted on the application of Muslim Munir Ahmed.

Saleem Khurshid Khokhar, a Christian provincial legislator in Sindh, and Khalid Gill, head of the All Pakistan Minorities Alliance in Punjab, said that police were threatening and harassing relatives and close friends of Joseph and William to reveal their whereabouts.

Islamists armed with pistols and rifles had waited for the two Christian couples to return to their rented home on May 21, seeking to kill them after the couples complained to police that the radical Muslims had falsely accused them of desecrating the Quran.

The blasphemy laws include Section 295-A for injuring religious feelings, 295-B for defiling the Quran and 295-C for blaspheming Muhammad, the prophet of Islam – all of which have often been misused by fanatical Muslims to settle personal scores against Christians.

Maximum punishment for violation of Section 295-A, as well as for Section 295-B (defiling the Quran), is life imprisonment; for violating Section 295-C the maximum punishment is death, though life imprisonment is also possible.

In village 123/10R in Khanewal district, Anjum noted that it is only 22 kilometers (14 miles) from Shanti Nagar, where Muslims launched an attack on Christians in 1997 that burned hundreds of homes and 13 church buildings.

Yousaf Masih added, “Muslim villagers have made the life a hell for Christians at village 123/10R.”

Report from Compass Direct News

Pakistani Muslims Allegedly Poison Christian Employees to Death

Two brothers die, third in critical condition, after complaining they were not paid.

GUJRANWALA, Pakistan, December 15 (CDN) — Muslim employers of three Christian sanitation workers at a banquet/wedding hall here allegedly poisoned the three workers yesterday, killing two of them; at press time the third was struggling for life in intensive care.

The father of the three workers, Yousaf Masih, said the owner of the hall, along with the manager, poisoned his sons because they were Christians who had dared to ask for pay owed to them.

Imran Masih, 29, and Irfan Masih, 25, died at the Ferozewala Pul Banquet & Marriage Hall after being forced to drink something that was heavily poisoned, Yousaf Masih said. The third worker, 23-year-old Aakash Masih, was in critical condition at the Intensive Care Unit of Civil Hospital Gujranwala, in Punjab Province.

“It appears from the position they were in that they were forced to consume some kind of poisoned drink, or a drug, and they were left there to die,” Yousaf Masih said. “The administration of the banquet and wedding hall did not call a hospital or take them to a hospital – instead they called us after the death of two of our loved ones.”

The Peoples Colony police station has registered a murder and deception case against Imtiyas Warriach, owner of the Ferozewala Pul Banquet & Marriage Hall, and hall manager Abid Virk. At press time they remained at large.

The chief of the Peoples Colony police station was not available for comment, but an officer told Compass that the two suspects would be arrested soon.

The family learned of the deaths when another of Yousaf Masih’s sons, 21-year-old Javed Masih, received a telephone call at home from the owner, Warriach, saying that his older brother Imran Masih was lying dead on the floor of the wedding hall.

Because they had not been paid, the three brothers had left the hall to work elsewhere before returning this past weekend. Javed Masih said he spoke by telephone on Friday (Dec. 11) with Warriach, when the owner called asking for his three brothers to return to work.

“The owner and manager of the wedding hall called me in the early morning of Dec. 11 and pleaded for my three brothers to rejoin and start working,” Javed Masih said. “They promised to reimburse their previous outstanding wages, as well as pay them a Christmas bonus and overtime. At this my brothers agreed and went to work the next morning.”

When Yousaf and Javed Masih were summoned to the wedding hall yesterday, they found Imran Masih and Irfan Masih dead. Aakash Masih was alive but lying still on the floor, they said.

Yousaf Masih said his sons had long told him that owner Warriach and manager Virk refused to pay their daily wages, and that the managers and staff members at the hall spoke derogatorily to them for being Christians.

“On demand of their daily wages, the owner and manager had threatened them that they would continue to work without payment or face the dire consequences,” Yousaf Masih said. “After my sons rejoined as sanitation workers, both Warriach and Virk started to make fun of them for leaving the job previously. Both the Muslim men mocked my sons for being Christian and called them by pejorative names such as ‘Choohra.’”

Yousaf Masih, 47, told Compass at the Sargodha offices of human rights group Rays of Development Organization that his sons had worked at the same wedding hall since the day it opened in 2005. Sobbing, he said that the owner and manager had never paid them their full wages during that time, so they had begun looking for other work a few weeks before the Islamic festival of sacrifice, called Eid-ul-Azha.

Muslims refrain from marrying during the Islamic month of Muharram, so in the small window of time between the start of that month and the end of the Eid-ul-Azha festival, wedding halls thrive and require all available help, he said.

Javed Masih said the bodies of Imran Masih and Irfan Masih were moved to the morgue at Civil Hospital Gujranwala for autopsy.

Report from Compass Direct News 

Police in Pakistan Shoot Mourners at Funeral of Christian

Authorities allegedly kill young man in custody on contrived charge of desecrating Quran.

LAHORE, Pakistan, September 17 (CDN) — At a funeral for a Christian man allegedly tortured to death while in custody on a spurious charge of blaspheming the Quran, police in Sialkot, Pakistan yesterday fired on mourners trying to move the coffin to another site.

Area Christians suspect police killed 22-year-old Robert Danish, nicknamed “Fanish” or “Falish” by friends, by torturing him to death on Tuesday (Sept. 15) after the mother of his Muslim girlfriend contrived a charge against him of desecrating Islam’s scripture. The allegation led to calls from mosque loudspeakers to punish Christians, prompting an Islamic mob to attack a church building in Jathikai village on Friday (Sept. 11) and beat several of the 30 families forced to flee their homes.

Jathikai was Danish’s native village, and some family members and other Christians wished to transfer his coffin to his hometown. Eyewitnesses at the funeral in Christian Town, Sialkot, said police fired shots directly at the Christians, injuring three, when mourners began to move the coffin toward nearby Jathikai. Mourners fled.

Sialkot is 125 kilometers (78 miles) northwest of Lahore in Punjab Province.

Controversy swirled around the cause of Danish’s death, with Christians refusing to accept police claims that he committed suicide. Results of forensic tests are expected within a week.

The dark moment for Danish’s family grew gloomier yesterday when police seemed to be seeking the first excuse for heavy-handed tactics at the funeral attended by hundreds of people, Christian sources said. When the family and other Christians tried to take the coffin to his hometown of Jathikai, police fired on them, charged them with batons and snatched the body from them, Christian sources said. 

Eyewitness Sajawal Masih told Compass that as soon as mourners lifted the coffin, police began firing tear gas.

“We were running when police opened fire and one bullet went through my foot, and two others also were injured,” he said.

There were reports of Christian youths pelting officers with stones, and police reportedly said that they needed to rush the crowd and make arrests to prevent “further disturbances.”

On Tuesday night (Sept. 15), Danish’s survivors and other Christians had decided that the body would be buried in Christian Town because of the dangers of potential attack in Jathikai, according to Christian Town Councilor Tanveer Saqib. Saqib said that the funeral was to be held at 10 a.m. on Wednesday (Sept. 16) at the Christian Technical Institute (CTI) Ground in Christian Town, Sialkot city.

Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) Member of National Assembly (MNA) Akram Gill said that when he and several youths took the body from the CTI Ground and began heading toward Jathikai village, police began firing. Gill told Compass that police opened fire on them as well as the crowd, injuring three Christians.

Gill, a Christian, added that police also shot tear gas, and that officers arrested about 100 Christians. The national assembly member said police arrested him and took Danish’s body to the Christian Town Graveyard in Sialkot. In spite of the tear gas, Gill said, he and others went to the graveyard but encountered armed police who also fired tear gas, turning them back.

For three hours, Gill said, Criminal Investigation Department police detained him, and although he was released, police arrested PML-Q Member of Provincial Assembly (MPA) Shehzad Elahi and his whereabouts were still unknown. He said that whenever Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) members come into power in the province, problems for Christians multiply.

Cause of Death

How Danish died remained unclear. Allama Iqbal Hospital Deputy Medical Superintendent Sajid Hussein told Compass that on Danish’s body there was a large welt on the back of the neck and “marks on the legs and back.” He said it was too soon to determine cause of death but that police had pronounced it a suicide.

Tissues taken from the body have been sent to Lahore for chemical and histopathology tests. He said these tests would indicate how the wounds were made, including whether they were inflicted after death.

“The report of these tests would come within a week, and I would inform the media of its findings,” he said. “I cannot comment on whether he committed suicide or not, as the matter is before the court.”

There were unconfirmed reports that state officials were pressuring doctors at Allama Iqbal Hospital to declare Danish’s death a suicide; Hussein denied these statements, telling Compass that they were “mere rumors.”

Hussein said that two Christian doctors, one from Bethania Hospital and the medical superintendent of Jalalpur Jattan Mission Hospital, were allowed to observe the autopsy. Christian Town Councilor Tanveer Saqib said that after the autopsy, the two Christian doctors came out and told media in front of thousands of Christians that Danish had been tortured to death.

Saqib said Danish’s father received the body and, accompanied by thousands of Christians, took it to Baithania Mission Hospital. The procession was so big that it took nearly four hours, though the route was not far.

Over the weekend Danish’s father had been unduly arrested, and upon his release a station house officer told Danish’s uncle, Saleem Masih, that even though Danish’s father was being released, Danish never would be. Saleem Masih told Compass that Danish’s father went back to his jailed son and told him, “My son, we have been trying our best to save you, but it doesn’t seem we will succeed. I think it is the last time I’m seeing you, so I commit you in the Lord’s hands.”

Councilor Saqib said that a Christian constable posted at the Sialkot District Jail told him that he saw Danish in the jail at around 7 a.m. and that he appeared unharmed. At about 10 a.m., however, jail administrators called important figures in the Christian community and told them that Danish had committed suicide, Saqib said.

Danish’s body was taken to a trauma center for a CT scan, he said, then to Riffat Idrees Hospital for an MRI.

“Along with the body were two Christian doctors – Dr. Tariq Malik and Dr. Qammar Sohail – and we were confident that they would tell the facts,” he said, adding that Malik had all medical reports of these tests.

The Punjab provincial government has ordered an investigation into the death, and three prison officials have reportedly been suspended.

Tragic Love

A paternal cousin of Danish identified only as Parveen confirmed reports that the conflict grew out of a romantic relationship between Danish and Hina Asghar, a young Muslim woman. She said Danish and Asghar were neighbors and had been seeing each other for three or four years.

On the night of Sept. 10, Parveen told Compass, Danish and Asghar met on the roof, angering the young Muslim’s mother. Early the next morning, Asghar’s mother spoke of the affair with the wife of local Muslim cleric identified only as Amanullah; the cleric’s wife in turn warned Asghar that both she and Danish could lose their lives if the relationship continued, Parveen said.

When Danish met Asghar on the road the next morning, Parveen said, the young Muslim woman refused to talk to him but tried to hand him a letter explaining the warning she had received. Upset, Danish batted her hand away as she was trying to give him the letter.

“Because he pushed her hand with a jerk, supara 21 [a section of the Quran larger than a sura, or chapter] fell from her hand and dropped onto a nearby sewage stream and got smeared with garbage,” Parveen said.

Saleem Masih, Danish’s uncle, questions that what fell from Asghar’s hand was a part of the Quran. He told Compass that Asghar was trying to give Danish a green-colored diary that only looked like the similarly green-covered section of the Quran. After the rumor began circulating that Danish had blasphemed the Quran, Saleem Masih said, Danish told his mother that it was not the Quran but a green diary that Asghar was trying to give him which fell.

According to Parveen, Asghar returned home and began cleaning the recovered scripture part, and her mother asked how it became sullied, Parveen said. Asghar’s mother subsequently rushed to cleric Amanullah’s wife, who then told her husband about the incident.

Saleem Masih told Compass that he and his wife, along with Danish’s parents, went to Hina Asghar’s father, Asghar Ali, bowed before him and pleaded for him to stop the false rumors of desecration of the Quran. He responded that Muslim cleric Amanullah would decide on it after the Friday prayers, and that the matter was not in their hands anymore.

On that day, Sept. 11, at about 11 a.m., the Muslim cleric announced during the Friday prayer that a Christian had blasphemed by desecrating the Quran, Parveen said.

Islamic mobs brandishing sticks were already arriving in the village, shouting against Danish and demanding that he be hung to death. They also occupied a house that he owned. Surrounding families fled their homes, leaving domestic animals without food and water.

Relatives Thrashed

Nadeem Masih, a paternal cousin of Danish, said that when he arrived at the village by motorbike that day, a large number of emotionally charged Muslims were setting Calvary Church on fire.

He said several Muslims had surrounded Danish’s father, Riasat Masih, and that he managed to get his uncle onto his motorbike to try to escape. They sped through several mob attempts to stop them and were eventually pursued by two Muslims on motorcycles. As Nadeem and Riasat Masih entered the main road, their motorbike slid and fell as they barely avoided an approaching truck. Nadeem Masih escaped but his uncle, Danish’s father, was captured.

Saleem Masih said that the Muslim mob took hold of Danish’s father, tied him up and were about to set him on fire when elderly men intervened, saying punishment for that crime would be too great, and suggested they instead only beat him. After beating Danish’s father, the Muslim mob untied him and took him into the church, where they burned Bibles, hymn books and other items and continued beating him.

Christian sources said police arrived and arrested Riasat Masih – not his attackers – and took him to the police station. Riasat Masih filed a crime report against the jailor and police officials at the Civil Lines Police Station, according to Christian Town Councilor Saqib.

Saleem Masih told Compass that he also was beaten. He said he was with Calvary Church Senior Pastor Dilshad Masih when they arrived in the village to find the mob setting church articles on fire and striking it with whatever they could find on hand. Realizing he could do nothing, Saleem Masih said he ran to his farmhouse, also owned by a Muslim named Bao Munir.

Munir took hold of him, he said.

“He brought out my cot and other belongings and set them on fire, and then he also tried to burn me in this fire,” Saleem Masih said.

Munir told him he could either be burned or go with him back to the village, and he forced all of the Christian’s clothes off of him except a cloth covering his loins and burned them, Saleem Masih said. After some struggle, he said, he managed to escape.

Danish, meantime, was hiding in a house in Jathikai village but was arrested the next morning (Sept. 12) when he went out for drinking water.

Tensions escalated, a source told Compass, when cleric Sabir Ali announced from his mosque in nearby Bhopalwala village that a Christian boy had blasphemed Islam by throwing the Quran in a drain.

Church Fire

After Calvary Church was set on fire, about 30 nearby families fled from the brutal beatings. Eyewitnesses told Compass that the assailants first went to Danish’s house. Not finding anyone there, they attacked the locked church which was only three houses from his.

The eyewitnesses, who were still in hiding and fearing further attacks, said that the assailants burned Bibles and hymnbooks. The assailants brought the church cross out, they said, and beat it with their shoes. The sources said the attackers were mainly from Shabab-e-Milli, a wing of the Muslim extremist Jamaat-e-Islami.

Christian Town Councilor Saqib said that the mob got hold of Calvary Church Senior Pastor Masih and severely beat him while police stood by. Police kept Saqib and his team from going to the blazing Calvary Church building, signaling them from afar not to come near, he said. He added that they had to turn back as the rampaging Muslims turned on them to attack, which police made no effort to stop. 

Pastor Masih told Compass that when he and Saleem Masih arrived at the church building, Muslims shouted at them, “Catch these Christians!” He remained standing as others fled, he said, and the mob beat him and took his mobile phone.

“They wanted to kill me, but miraculously I managed to run from there,” he said.

Saqib said MPA Kamran Michael of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PLM-N), the ruling party in Punjab province, reached the village on Friday, but police did not allow him to go to the burning church, citing security threats. About 500 Christians later gathered in Sialkot to protest the church fire, with Michael addressing the crowd.

Michael said that one of the protestors reminded him that after Islamic mobs burned homes in Gojra last month, he had vowed to resign if further attacks took place. The crowd then began demanding that he resign, and police opened fire and charged the crowd with batons. He added that throughout the incident there were several media vans, but none of the major television stations covered the protest.

Several Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) and Christian media also faced difficulties in getting in the village, though in all previous incidents media and NGOs were allowed access. In this case, however, police told them that they were not allowed due to security reasons. Also unable to gain access to Jathikai was Pakistan People’s Party provincial Assembly Member Amna Buttar and minority rights groups.

George and Butta Masih, along with four family members, were in Jathikai tending to their five cows on Sunday (Sept. 13). George Masih told a Compass reporter who had somehow got into the village that they stayed home all day and went out only at night to bring some fodder for the animals. They said that Muslims would beat any Christians seen during the day.

On Sunday about 500 to 700 Muslim women staged a protest in Sialkot to refute the notion that a Muslim woman could fall in love with a Christian man.

Several Christian and secular organizations in Lahore have scheduled a candle-light vigil today (Sept. 17) as a memorial for Danish and other members of Pakistan’s minority communities who have been killed or attacked in Islamist attacks.

A field officer for advocacy group Community Development Initiative, Napoleon Qayyum, said such attacks were weakening the Christian community. 

“After the Gojra incident, several Christians said that their Muslim employers had told them not to come to work anymore,” Qayyum said. “This economic dependence further plays part in seeking justice.” 

He added that in the June 30 Islamist attack on Bahmaniwala, in Kasur district, Christians did not want to pursue justice as they worked on Muslims’ land and could not afford confrontation.

“Their fear is that they would be left without jobs,” he said. “Due to economic dependence and poor status, Christians neither pursue their cases, nor do they defend themselves in such instances.”

Report from Compass Direct News 

Pakistani police tortured pregnant Christian woman

International Christian Concern (ICC) has learned that a pregnant Christian woman miscarried on July 26 after police beat her and dragged her naked through their police station in the Gujrat District of Punjab, Pakistan. Police had arrested her and a Muslim woman after their employer accused them of theft, but police did not even touch the Muslim woman, reports Dan Wooding, founder of ASSIST Ministries.

An ICC spokesperson said that the woman, Farzana Bibi, worked as a maid in the house of a wealthy Muslim. During a wedding held at the house, some jewelry was stolen from some of the landlord’s female relatives. The police were called, and when they arrived at the scene they arrested two maids: Farzana and a Muslim woman named Rehana.

Nazir Masih, Farzana’s husband, said, “Police registered a fake theft case against my wife and Rehana without any proof.”

Nazir went on to say that the police tortured his wife even though she told them she was pregnant. He told ICC, “Sub-Inspector Zulfiqar and Assistant Sub-Inspector Akhter subjected her to intense torture. They stripped off her clothes and dragged her naked around the compound of Cantonment Area Police Station in Kharian. They humiliated and tortured my wife, but did not do anything to Rehana.”

The ICC spokesperson said, “Although Farzana complained of severe pain, the police ignored her pleas and detained her for another two days. When her condition became critical, the police finally transferred her to the Tehsil Headquarters Hospital in Kharian, where she miscarried.

“Nazir filed a report with the District Police Officer in Gujrat, detailing the abuse his wife received and her miscarriage. The District Office initiated an investigation after receiving the report, withdrawing the false accusations and suspending officers Zulfiqar and Akhter.

“The authorities have pledged to punish all those responsible. Please pray that God would comfort Farzana and Nazir and that justice would be carried out. Please also call your Pakistani embassy and ask them to defend the rights of Christians.”

Jeremy Sewall, ICC’s Advocacy Director, said, “While we were not able to confirm whether Farzana was innocent of robbing her employers, it is absolutely unacceptable for police to humiliate her and abuse her so severely that she lost her child. The fact that the Muslim woman accused of the same thing was at least treated like a human being just proves again that if you are not a Muslim in Pakistan, you have no rights. The government should go beyond suspending the two officers guilty of this crime and try them for manslaughter.”

Report from the Christian Telegraph 

IRAQ: FLEEING CHRISTIANS FACE NEW HARDSHIPS IN TURKEY

As renewed violence in Mosul halts return, refugees wait in Turkish legal limbo.

ISTANBUL, November 14 (Compass Direct News) – In this Turkish city’s working-class neighborhood of Kurtulus, Arabic can be heard on the streets, signs are printed in the Arabic alphabet and Iraqis congregate in tea shops.

In 99-percent Muslim Turkey, most of these Iraqis are not Muslims. And they are not in Turkey by choice. They are Christian refugees who fled their homeland to escape the murderous violence that increasingly has been directed at them.

It is hard to tell how many of Mosul’s refugees from the recent wave of attacks have made their way to Istanbul, but finding these residents here is not hard. A middle-aged Iraqi refugee who fled Mosul five months ago now attends a Syrian Orthodox Church in the poverty-stricken neighborhood of Tarlabasi, where gypsies, transvestites, and immigrants from Turkey’s east live in hopes of a better life in Istanbul.

Declining to give his name, the refugee said there is no future for Christians in Iraq and that nearly everyone he knew there wanted to leave the country. He said the only hope for Iraqi Christians is for Western countries to open their doors to Christian Iraqi refugees.

“We don’t have hope,” he said. “If these doors aren’t opened, we will be killed.”

Since October, violence in Mosul has pushed more than 12,000 Christians from their homes and left more than two dozen dead, according to U.N. and Christian organizations. In the face of Mosul violence, Iraqi Christians flee to Turkey before settling permanently in another country, usually in a place where their family has gone out before them.

 

Christian Sisters Killed

Weeks after the mass exodus of Mosul Christians to surrounding villages, Turkey and other nations, around one-third of families reportedly have returned due to the presence of 35,000 army and police and the Iraqi government offering cash grants of up to $800.

But those returning Christians were shaken again on Wednesday (Nov. 12), when Islamic militants stormed into the house of two Syrian Catholic sisters, Lamia’a Sabih and Wala’a Saloha, killing them and severely injuring their mother. They then bombed their house and detonated a second explosive when the police arrived, which killed three more.

The Christian family had recently returned after having fled Mosul. Many believe this attack will deter other Christians from returning to Mosul, and there are reports of Christians again leaving the area.

There has been a steady exodus of Christians from Iraq since the first Gulf War in 1991. The church in Iraq dates from the beginning of Christianity, but the population has plummeted by 50 percent in the last 20 years. The outflow of Iraqi Christians spiked in 2003 following the U.S.-led invasion.

Although Iraq as a whole has seen a dramatic decrease in violence due to last year’s surge in U.S. troops, the flight of Christians to Turkey has grown. One-third of the 18,000 refugees who registered in Turkey last year are from Iraq. In Syria, an estimated 40 percent of the 1.2 million Iraqis who have fled Iraq are Christians, though they make up only about 3 percent of Iraq’s population.

Monsignor Francois Yakan, the 50-year-old leader of the Chaldean Church in Turkey, said all Iraqi refugees are undergoing hardships regardless of religion, but that the situation is especially difficult for Christians since there is less support for them in Turkey.

“Muslims have the same difficulty as Christians, but there are more foundations to assist them,” he said. “The government notices Muslim immigrants, but nobody pays attention to us.”

Yakan travels to other countries to raise awareness of the plight of Iraqi Christians, trying to marshal the support of government and church leaders – last week he traveled to France, Romania and Germany. If Western governments don’t wake up to this crisis, he said, the results could be catastrophic.

“People don’t know the plight of Iraqi Christians. They have no government, no soldiers, and no power,” he said. “Christianity in Iraq is ending. Why aren’t they noticing this?”

 

Strangers in Strange Land

The unnamed Iraqi refugee in Tarlabasi said not even pleas from Iraqi priests can make them stay.

“The church in Iraq can’t stop the people from leaving because they can’t guarantee their security,” he said.

He came to Istanbul with his family but still has an adult son and daughter in the city. He hopes to join his brother in the United States soon.

A group of Iraqi refugees at a tea shop in the Kurtulus area of Istanbul interrupted their card game to talk to Compass of their troubled lives.

“We can’t find any work,” said Baghdad-born Iraqi Jalal Toma, who acted as the translator for the group. He pointed to a young man at the table and said, “He works moving boxes and carrying things, and they pay him half as much as a Turk for a day’s work.”

All of the men are Chaldean Christians, a Catholic Eastern-rite church whose historical homeland is in northern Iraq, and came from Mosul in recent months. They are chronically under-employed and rely on financial help from family members abroad to make ends meet.

They had to flee their homes at a moment’s notice, taking along their families but leaving behind their cars, houses and most of their possessions. The men hope to join family members who live in foreign countries, but they harbor few hopes that they can ever return to Iraq again.

 

Offering Relief

Work is scarce for refugees and hard to come by legally in Turkey. To survive, most Iraqi Christians rely on money from families abroad or the handful of local church charities that struggle to keep up with the overwhelming volume of refugees, such as the Istanbul Interparish Migrant Program, an ecumenical umbrella group that unites the city’s parishes to assist migrants and asylum seekers.

Another such charity is Kasdar, the Chaldean-Assyrian-Syriac Humanitarian, Social and Cultural Organization, run by Yakan, the Chaldean Church leader in Turkey.

He launched Kasdar two years ago to provide a safety net for Christian refugees who live in Turkey’s legal limbo. Kasdar assists all Christians regardless of denomination or faith tradition and has 16 volunteers from an equally diverse background.

Yakan sees thousands of refugees pass through Istanbul each year. Most of them are Chaldean, and he knows of 60-70 people who fled due to the recent October violence in Mosul. He travels constantly to visit Chaldean refugees scattered throughout the country.

When refugees first arrive in Turkey, they must register with the United Nations as asylum seekers. The Turkish police then assign them to one of 35 cities to live in as they wait to receive official refugee status. These Christians face the biggest hardships since they don’t have access to the same social resources as refugees in Istanbul, said Metin Corabatir, U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees spokesman in Turkey.

“The Chaldean population faces problems in Turkey, especially due to the policy of resettling them to satellite cities,” said Corabatir. “The Chaldeans in Istanbul have NGOs [Non-Governmental Organizations] and churches to help them, but in satellite cities there is no church or community to help them.”

Most refugees send their children to school at a local center run by Caritas, a Catholic confederation of relief, development and social service organizations. Here, Iraq children receive education and lessons in basic vocational skills.

The wait for legal status can be as short as a few months or a couple of years. But complicated circumstances can push back the wait to five years, 10 years, or even 17 years – as it is now for a man who fled during the first Gulf War, Yakan of the Chaldean Church said.

Another church leader who has helped Christian refugees is 70-year-old Monsignor Yusuf Sag, vicar general of the Syrian Catholic Church in Turkey. His 350-person congregation assembles packets of clothes and food for the refugees.

Many who come to Sag also seek medical help. He has connections with doctors throughout the city, both Muslim and Christian, who offer basic treatment to refugees free of charge. Sag said he tries to help all who come to him, without asking them of their denomination or even their religion.

“Their situation is not a Christian problem, but a human problem,” he said.

Often Iraqi Christians work illegally, where they are vulnerable to extortion. Refugee workers in Istanbul said registered asylum seekers can work legally, but it is not uncommon for employers to garnish their wages or withhold them completely, with the foreigners getting little protection from police.

The Turkish government charges a refugee a residence tax of US$460 a year and will not allow them to leave the country until it is paid, making them remain in the country even longer. With all these hurdles to finding stable employment, many Iraqi refugees are never too far from homelessness.

“There was a family we found living on the streets – a husband, wife and two children,” Yakan said. “They have lived in Istanbul for six months and couldn’t even afford to pay rent.”

His foundation found the family an apartment and assisted them with rent, but they only have enough resources to help for two months.

Kasdar gave similar assistance to 54 families in October. But the organization can only help for a few months at a time and assist the most vulnerable refugees.

Report from Compass Direct News