Muslim Villager in Pakistan Allegedly Rapes Sixth Christian Girl

Police say son of local land owner confessed to multiple sexual assaults.

TARKHANI, Pakistan, January 14 (CDN) — A Muslim who allegedly confessed to sexually assaulting five Christian girls raped a 10-year-old Catholic girl in Punjab Province last month, according to her family.

Tarkhani police have charged 25-year-old Muhammad Aftab, also known as Chandu, with raping a minor (section 376 of the Pakistan Penal Code) in a sugar cane field in Village 226-GB, according to First Information Report (FIR) No. 429 at the Tarkhani Police Station. Aftab has been arrested and remanded to Central Jail Faisalabad.

Aftab allegedly raped the girl on Dec. 10, Abid Masih, a 31-year-old relative of the girl, told Compass in village 226-GB, Tarkhani near Gojra.

“Though we had informed the Tarkhani police station, for a day we kept quiet as the rapist had gone underground, and we waited for him to come out,” Masih told Compass at his home. “When the rapist saw that no one has taken action against him, he came out, and our girl immediately identified him.”

Masih said the girl, whose name is withheld, went to a nearby field with 7-year-old Sahil Abid to load sugar cane for transport to a processing plant. The girl’s father, 55-year-old electrician Yousaf Masih, said that Aftab seized her and rushed into the sugar cane fields.

“Sahil Abid started screaming for help, but no one was there to help him,” Abid Masih said. “Therefore he came running to us and told us that a man kidnapped her and has taken her to the sugar cane fields.”

Sahil took him and Yousaf Masih to the site, Abid Masih said.

“As we reached there, that man masked his face and disappeared into the dense sugar cane fields,” he said.

Abid Masih took her to the Tehsil Headquarters (THQ) Hospital, Samundri, he said.

Family members said that doctors at Samundri THQ Hospital confirmed that the girl was raped, and the FIR also notes that the medical report by doctors at the hospital states that she was raped.

“SHO [the Station House Officer] pleas to the honorable Court of Law to penalize the rapist/pedophile, who has confessed during interrogation to raping at least five other little Christian girls before this sad incident,” the FIR states. “The culprit is sent to Central jail Faisalabad under judicial remand on the orders of the court and deserves exemplary punishment.”

Abid Masih and Yousaf Masih said that Sahil also was unable to see the rapist’s face, but that the girl was able to recognize him because she had been assaulted by him in the fields. They said she identified Aftab, the son of a local land owner.

“It’s not the first time he has raped a minor girl,” Abid Masih said. “He has raped at least five little Christian girls before this, but those families under pressure kept their mouths shut, and Christians also tried to force us to keep quiet and refrain from filing a police case, as they were fearful that it might worsen the relations between Christian and Muslim villagers.”

Area sources said local Christians were angry with the family of Yousaf Masih for taking legal action against the rapist, believing that it would damage relations between Muslims and Christians.

Report from Compass Direct News

PAKISTAN: ISLAMISTS GET MINORITY RIGHTS LEADER JAILED

CLAAS director Joseph Francis charged with forged documents in assault case.

LAHORE, Pakistan, July 14 (Compass Direct News) – Well-known Pakistani minority rights activist Joseph Francis and two others were jailed on Sunday (July 12) for forged documents in connection with false charges of assaulting a woman who visited his office in 2006, their lawyers said.

Francis, national director of the Centre for Legal Aid Assistance and Settlement (CLAAS), which for more than two decades has defended Christians and others against spurious charges by Islamists, was arrested on Thursday (July 9) along with CLAAS official Ashar Sarfaraz and Sarfaraz’s brother-in-law, Zulfiqar Wilson.

Judge Malik Muhammad Mushataq remanded all three to two days of police custody under pressure from Islamists who have harassed Francis and the other two men with false accusations, CLAAS lawyers said, and on Sunday a magistrate sent them to jail to await trial.

“This is the first time in my 19 years of work that I have been so set up by the judicial system,” said one of Francis’ lawyers, Akbar Munawar Durrani. “The judge was blind to the facts presented before him.”

The lawyer told Compass that the court did not listen to their arguments for releasing Francis as it was biased toward the Islamists who have urged the woman to charge the CLAAS officials with assault. In December 2006 CLAAS officers had counseled the woman, identified only as Roma, when her Christian family brought her to the CLAAS office after she converted to Islam.

“She was brought to us because she had converted to Islam, and her parents wanted us to explain to her the consequences and implication of doing so,” said CLAAS Program Officer Katherine Sapna.

The woman had changed her name to Aisha and had married Mehboob Basharat, a Muslim who had converted to Christianity and then “reverted” back to Islam. CLAAS lawyers said that Basharat, whom police describe as “fraudulent,” along with an Islamist group and a church-going lawyer at odds with the local Christian community, are behind the assault charges officially filed by Roma/Aisha.

Francis and the two others are in Camp Jail in Lahore; today a judge denied their plea for release on bail. CLAAS lawyers said they expect to file for bail in Sessions Court this week.

Francis is charged with forging documents in the 2007 case in which he and the two others are accused of beating Roma/Aisha, “misbehaving” with her and setting her on fire, lawyers said. The forgery charges arose, said Sapna, after two former CLAAS staff members submitted a fake medical certificate indicating that Francis was too ill to appear at court on July 14, 2007 for a hearing on the assault charges.

Francis was out of the country at the time of the hearing and was not aware that the two CLAAS staff members, Justin Gill and Aneeqa Maria, had submitted the false medical certificate, Sapna said. Both Gill and Maria have since left CLAAS.

Assault Charges

Sapna told Compass that the Christian parents of the woman then known as Roma brought her to CLAAS offices on Dec. 23, 2006. Roma’s mother, Shamim Bibi, and sisters Shabana and Taskeen, were with her at the CLAAS office, where all three spent the night at CLAAS’s second-floor shelter for abuse victims, Sapna said.

Roma/Aisha’s husband called police the next day, and officers ordered her family to bring her to the Race Course Police Station, Sapna said. Christmas was near and most of the CLAAS staff members were gone for the holiday, so Francis himself went to the police station. When police questioned Roma/Aisha, she never mentioned being mistreated while in the CLAAS offices, Sapna said.

CLAAS staff members forgot the matter until Basharat and church-going attorney Raja Nathaniel Gill held a press conference on Feb. 18, 2007 in which they had Roma/Aisha claim that she had been attacked at the CLAAS office. In May 2007 Basharat, Gill and the Islamist group had her file a First Information Report (FIR) at Ichhra police station charging that during her stay at CLAAS, staff members beat her, forced her to revert to Christianity, doused her with kerosene oil and set her ablaze inside a locked room.

Sapna said Roma/Aisha’s FIR also claimed Church of Pakistan Bishop Samuel Azariah threatened her by phone while she was at the CLAAS office. Gill had Roma implicate the bishop because CLAAS had been instrumental in clearing Bishop Azariah of charges of murdering his wife in April 2006, according to Sapna. She said that Gill bore a grudge against CLAAS because he had hoped to gain some advantage in the false charge against the bishop.

In response to an inquiry from Capital City (Lahore) Police, Ichhra police reported on March 7, 2007 that Basharat was a “fraudulent man” who repeatedly changed his religion in order to malign both Christianity and Islam, and that he repeatedly cheated on women. The Ichhra police quoted Basharat’s first wife, Fouzia, as saying he “had already cheated on four girls like this.”

Sapna said that Basharat originally converted from Islam to Christianity in 2001.

“He converted along with his wife Fouzia and two daughters,” she said. “He did a seminary course, and after that he became part of the clergy and joined 15 Waris Road Central Church, run by Bishop Samuel Azariah. Roma used to go to this church for theological studies and was Basharat’s student. There Basharat trapped her, and on Nov. 26, 2006 they got married [under Muslim rites].”

Compass obtained Fouzia Basharat’s court statement of March 8, 2007, which she gave after her husband had married Roma. In the statement, Fouzia said that on Sept. 12, 2006, her husband brought his pupil Roma to her and told her that she was his new wife – that he had married her in a Christian rite. She also said in her statement that Basharat later married Roma/Aisha under Muslim rites, and that Roma had changed her name to Aisha.

Fouzia Basharat then filed a case under Christian Marriage Act Section 22 applying for judicial separation. Sapna said that Fouzia Basharat initially resisted marriage to Basharat and warded off a later effort to reconvert her to Islam.

“During that time, she stayed at the Central Church, and her children continued their education at St. Peter’s High School,” Sapna said. She added that the Christian rite marriage of Roma/Aisha to Basharat was illegal, and that CLAAS had sought only to help resolve associated problems.

Sapna said CLAAS staff members were concerned about Francis remaining incarcerated, as he suffers from diabetes and hypertension.

Civil and District Judge Malik Mushtaq of Magistrate Section 30 will hear the forgery case.

Report from Compass Direct News 

PAKISTAN: TORTURED CHRISTIAN LANGUISHING ON FALSE CHARGES

Police maneuver to keep incapacitated son of preacher in jail – and out of hospital.

LAHORE, Pakistan, June 23 (Compass Direct News) – A 37-year-old Christian is languishing in a Sialkot jail after police broke his backbone because his father was preaching Christ, according to a local advocacy group.

Arshad Masih had been in a hospital – chained to his bed on false robbery charges – after police torture that began Dec. 28, 2008 left him incapacitated. He was discharged from General Hospital in Lahore on Saturday (June 20) and returned to jail despite efforts by the Community Development Initiative (CDI), a support group that is providing Masih legal assistance.

CDI Research Officer Napoleon Qayyum said that hospital personnel treated Masih callously, but that conditions there were better than in the jail in Sialkot. At least in the hospital, Qayyum said, Masih’s gray-haired father was able to carry him on his shoulders when he needed to go to the bathroom.

Hospital staff members released Masih even though they knew he would not receive the medical care he needs in jail and could face further abuse, the CDI researcher said.

“We told the hospital administration and doctors that Masih would be released from jail within a few days, so he should not be discharged from the hospital as he would not be taken care of in jail, but they paid no heed to our request,” Qayyum said.

He said Sialkot police gave assurances that Masih would be released from jail if he arrived there from the hospital by 10 p.m. A police van left early Saturday morning from Sialkot to bring Masih from the hospital in Lahore to Sialkot jail, but it did not reach the hospital until 6 p.m. even though it is only 100 kilometers (62 miles) from Sialkot to Lahore.

Qayyum said officers also invented delays on the return trip.

“Despite our requests to the police van staff, they reached the jail at 10:30 p.m.,” Qayyum said. “The Sialkot police used the delays to demoralize us by creating problems so that we do not file a petition for torturing.”

The CDI official said the group’s first priority is to “take him out of Sialkot so that police may not further create problems for him.”

Murder Threat

Hajipura police detained Masih on Dec. 28 on orders from the Sadar police station in Gujranwala, where Masih’s father, Iqbal Masih, had been preaching Christ.

The elder Masih, an itinerant preacher who has traveled to remote areas to proclaim Christ for three decades, told Compass that objections to his ministry led to false accusations of robbery against his son. Area Muslims resented his preaching and his visits to a Christian family in Gujranwala, he said, and told him to stop visiting the family.

“They told me that I was preaching a false religion and should stop doing it, and that I should succumb to their pressure,” the elder Masih told Compass.

Area Muslims had complained to Gujranwala police of the elder Masih’s efforts, and officers there first sought to arrest him in a case filed against “unidentified people,” he said. Later, he said, Gujranwala police told Hajipura police to charge his son in some robbery cases, as Arshad Masih lived in the Hajipura precincts.

When police arrested Arshad Masih on Dec. 28, they tortured him for several days, the younger Masih said.

“They hung me upside down all night, beat me and used all inhumane torture methods, leaving me permanently paralyzed,” he said.

Police falsely named him in a robbery case, according to CDI. All others named in the case were released after paying bribes, advocacy group officials said. Police officers also asked Masih’s father for a bribe of 50,000 rupees [US$620], the elder Masih said.

“They asked me as well for 50,000 rupees, but I refused to pay on the grounds that it was illegal and additionally I hadn’t that much money,” Iqbal Masih said.

The complainant in the robbery case eventually testified that Arshad Masih hadn’t been among the robbers, and he was granted bail. Before court orders reached the jail, however, Sialkot police informed Sadar police officers in Gujranwala, who arrived at the jail and had Masih remanded to them for a robbery case filed against “unidentified people.”

“Because of that, Masih could not be freed for one moment,” CDI’s Qayyum said.

Gujranwala police also threatened to kill Masih in a staged police encounter if he told the court that he had been tortured, according to CDI. They also warned him that he should not act as if he were in any pain in court.

The court, however, found him unable to stand and sent him to Allama Iqbal Memorial Hospital in Sialkot for medical examination. Gujaranwala police therefore had to leave him. But police did not tell Masih or CDI staff which police station was keeping Masih in its custody at the hospital.

With the help of the American Center for Law and Justice, CDI filed a case in the Gujranwala Sessions court for Masih’s bail and also provided some assistance for his medical treatment.

On June 16, the Sadar police station investigating officer told the court that police under his command were not detaining Masih, but that the Sialkot police were. Because the Gujranwala police were not detaining him, he argued, bail orders issued on March 23 for Masih’s release pertained to Sialkot and therefore Masih’s police custody in the hospital was illegal.

“The police have been keeping us in the dark so that we could never pursue the case in the right direction,” said CDI’s Qayyum. “How can a brutally tortured patient even heal their wounds in such mental agony when his hand is always tied in chains, and two policemen are maintaining a 24-hour watch over him?”

The researcher said he maintained hope that the judicial system would provide Masih relief from his agony, which has taken its toll on his family as well. Masih has three children that he has pulled from school due to lack of money.

His wife is illiterate and cannot make a living, CDI officials said, adding that Masih’s four married sisters are the main sources of his financial support.

Report from Compass Direct News

INDIA: NEWS BRIEFS

Recent Incidents of Persecution

Karnataka, November 18 (Compass Direct News) – Police on Nov. 16 arrested a pastor and charged him with “hurting religious sentiments” in Vangasandra, Hosur Road, Bangalore, after a mob of Hindu extremists stormed into his house church service and struck him. Dr. Sajan K. George, national president of the Global Council of Indian Christians (GCIC), said that at 11 a.m. a mob of nearly 25 Hindu extremists from the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and Vishwa Hindu Parishad (World Hindu Council) barged into the house church service and repeatedly slapped the pastor, identified only as Sujnanamm, and shouted filthy curses at the 15 other Christians present. Laxminarayan Gowda, GCIC regional coordinator, told Compass that the extremists beat one of the Christians who tried to help the pastor. The intolerant Hindus forced Pastor Sujnanamm, with his nose bleeding, to go with them to the Madivala police station and registered a false complaint of forcible conversion against him, Gowda said. “On being questioned about his Christian activities, Sujnanamm told the police that he was a student at BBBC [Bhirian Baptist Bible College],” Gowda said. “This angered the police, who summoned the Rev. Edwin Chilli, president of the BBBC, to the police station and charged him under Section 506 for criminal intimidation.” At press time both Christian leaders were still in jail.

Karnataka – Police arrested three Christians on Nov. 12 on charges of attempted Christian conversion by allurement in Cox Town, Bangalore. The Global Council of Indian Christians reported that a Christian man identified only as Chandrasekhar and two Christian women, identified only as Kamlamma and Sandhya, all of Pavithra Agni Church, went to a slum area in Jeevanahalli to pray for a sick couple. On their way back home, nearly 20 Hindu extremists belonging to the Hindu extremist Rashtriya Swamyamsevak Sangh attacked them, snatched their bags, verbally abused them and falsely accused them of forcible conversion, then phoned a local police station. The Frazer Town Police took the three Christians to the police station and arrested them for “hurting religious sentiments” and “uttering words with deliberate intent to wound the religious feelings of any person.” The Evangelical Fellowship of India (EFI) reported that an employer of the slum dwellers identified only as Mr. Gowda also filed a complaint against the Christians for allegedly inducing people to convert to Christianity by fraudulent means. The two women were remanded to custody, and Chandrasekhar was sent to a jail the next day. The three Christians appeared in court on Nov. 13 and were ordered to remain in police custody till Nov. 28, according to the EFI.

Karnataka – Hindutva (Hindu nationalist) extremists belonging to the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (World Hindu Council or VHP) on Nov. 9 falsely accused a pastor of forced conversion, beat him and verbally abused Christian women in Banavara, Arasikere Taluk, Hassan district. The Global Council of Indian Christians reported that pastor Ravi Charles of Jesus Prayer Hall was summoned to perform the funeral service of a church member, a convert from Hinduism identified only as Girijama. As the pastor, his wife and other Christians reached the house of the deceased, an argument broke out among family members on whether the funeral was to proceed under Christian or Hindu rites. Hindu relatives informed VHP extremists. The Evangelical Fellowship of India reported that the VHP extremists arrived, accused the pastor of forced conversion and started beating him, as well as verbally abusing the Christian women. The extremists called police, who detained them for four hours and released them without charges.

Karnataka – Police on Nov. 4 arrested Benjamin Bommai, 52, of the Manonidhi Institute of Nursing (MIN) in Chamarajanagar district, on charges of forced conversion. MIN Manager Shailaja Krupanidhi told Compass that police summoned Bommai for questioning regarding a case filed by Hindu extremists from the Bajrang Dal in 2006 for distributing gospel tracts at Manonidhi College. The extremists had charged Bommai with trying to forcibly convert students. “On Nov. 4, Bommai was only called for enquiry – he did not distribute tracts or anything, but police arrested him,” said Krupanidhi. Bommai appeared before the district magistrate and was later sent to the Chamrajanagar jail. The Evangelical Fellowship of India reported that police arrested Bommai for promoting enmity between different groups of religion under Section 153A of the Indian Penal Code. “Bommai was released on bail the next evening,” said Krupanidhi.

Uttarakhand – Hindu extremists vandalized a church, severely injured a pastor’s ear drum and stole donation and offering bags on Nov. 3 in Dehradun. According to the Evangelical Fellowship of India, about 30 Hindu extremists from the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and Bajrang Dal barged into the worship hall of Bethesda Church and damaged Bibles and gospel literature and furniture. The assailants took the church’s offering and donation boxes along with important papers. The extremists also attacked Asher Wasker, a pastor from God’s Church in neighboring Rajpur, who had come to the aid of the attacked church. Pastor Wasker suffered internal injuries and his right ear drum was severely injured. Bethesda Church’s caretaker and Pastor Wasker filed a complaint with the help of area Christian leaders, and three Hindu extremists were arrested for voluntarily causing hurt and damage, for trespassing and wrongful restraint, for theft and for defiling a place of worship.

Karnataka – Police on Nov. 2 disrupted the Sunday worship service of a house church in Thimannakatte village, Haveri district, based on an accusation of forced conversion. According to the Christian Legal Association, police barged into the house church of the Dheiwah Ministry because villagers had accused pastor Rangaiah Nagaraj of forcible conversion. Police warned the pastor to obtain prior permission in order to conduct future worship meetings. But Inspector Krishan Junoor later said the pastor could continue to conduct worship meetings under police protection, adding that normalcy had returned to the area. No arrests had been made.

Andhra Pradesh – Nizambad district police detained a pastor for one-and-a-half days on a complaint of forced conversion filed against him by Hindu extremists on Oct. 24 in Nandipet Mandal, Nizambad. The Global Council of Indian Christians reported that at about 8 a.m., 20 Hindu extremists from the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (World Hindu Council) and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh barged into the house of pastor Martin Luther of Believers Church and attacked him, dragging him to the police station and accusing him of forcible conversion. The pastor was released after local Christian leaders met with Sub-Inspector Shiva Shankar.

Madhya Pradesh – Police on Oct. 12 arrested a pastor on charges of “fraudulent conversion” in Dhamnod town, Dhar District. The Global Council of Indian Christians (GCIC) reported that a complaint from a local resident led police to raid pastor Ganesh Bharud’s house church, seize Bibles, hymnals and gospel tracts, chase away the 25 Christians assembled for Sunday worship and force Bharud to the Dhamnod police station. A GCIC representative told Compass that the local resident had accused Bharud of inducing people to convert with false promises of an overseas job. Police officials told Compass that Bharud was released on bail on Oct. 13 at 5:30 p.m.  

Report from Compass Direct News