DEATH OR ISLAM

[Duchess]

One or the other. This woman was a given a choice, renounce her Christianity and return to Islam or die. Her response was that she was never a Muslim, she was raised a Christian from the start.

International outrage is mounting over the death sentence a Sudanese judge ordered for the pregnant wife of an American citizen — all because she refuses to renounce her Christian faith.

Meriam Ibrahim, 26, was sentenced Thursday after being convicted of apostasy. The court in Khartoum ruled that Ibrahim must give birth and nurse her baby before being executed, but must receive 100 lashes immediately after having her baby for adultery — for having relations with her Christian husband. Ibrahim, a physician and the daughter of a Christian mother and a Muslim father who abandoned the family as a child, could have spared herself death by hanging simply by renouncing her faith.

"We gave you three days to recant but you insist on not returning to Islam," Judge Abbas Khalifa told Ibrahim, according to AFP. "I sentence you to be hanged to death."

But Ibrahim held firm to her beliefs.

“I was never a Muslim,” she answered. “I was raised a Christian from the start.”

Story

[Midwest Spy]

There's the difference between Christianity and Islam right there.

[SIXFOOTERsez]

The religion of light and peace

[BlueTiki]

What . . . no outrage from Mullahs or Imams?

Sharia law rocks!

Or gives you a "suspended" sentence.

[HairOfTheDog]

One or the other. This woman was a given a choice, renounce her Christianity and return to Islam or die. Her response was that she was never a Muslim, she was raised a Christian from the start.

Ibrihim's brother is such a POS -- filing charges against his estranged sister knowing she could be put to death.

Anyway, it's being reported that the death sentence is not final, but under review in Sudanese court.

In the meantime, international pressure is mounting on the Sudanese government. The media coverage might ultimately save this woman's life.

Snip:



New Hampshire's senators are trying to help a U.S. citizen from Sudan working to save his pregnant wife, who has been sentenced to death for refusing to recant her Christian faith.

Daniel Wani (he's the husband who immigrated and is now an American citizen) is in Sudan, trying to save the life of his wife, Meriam Yeyha Ibrahim, who is jailed in the African country along with their 20-month-old son.

"I'm just praying for God. He can do a miracle," Wani's brother, Gabriel, who lives in Manchester, told WMUR-TV. "Everyone is depressed. You don't believe it. It's shock."

New Hampshire's Sen. Kelly Ayotte and fellow Republican Sen. Roy Blunt of Missouri wrote to Secretary of State John Kerry, urging him to grant Ibrahim political asylum.

"We request your immediate action and full diplomatic engagement to offer Meriam political asylum and to secure her and her son's safe release," the letter said.

Meanwhile, the British government summoned a senior Sudanese diplomat to express its anger at Ibrahim's death sentence.

Full story: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/senators-try...-in-sudan/

[Maggot]

There's a name for the drawings on her hands what is it? kenna or penna or something.

[Duchess]

It might be henna you're searching for.

[HairOfTheDog]

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL AND GLOBAL PETITION ENGAGED

Ibrahim delivered her baby girl, named Maya, while she was still in prison. According to her lawyer As Elshareef Ali Elshareef Mohammed, she gave birth in a prison clinic and was not taken to a hospital.

Her execution has been upheld by the court in Khartoum after she refused to recant her Christian faith but will not be carried out until Maya is two-years-old.

Christian Solidarity Worldwide is urging Sudanese officials to reverse the persecution of this Christian.

Ibrahim's husband, Daniel Wani, has vowed to fight the sentence, which includes 100 lashes for adultery, and lawyers have lodged an appeal.

Her case has been picked up by Amnesty International which is spearheading a campaign for her release and says that over 620,000 actions have been taken calling upon the Sudanese government to overturn the sentence.

Full story: http://www.christiantoday.com/article/ma.../37728.htm
-----------------------------------------

I'm hopeful that in the two year time frame before her execution is scheduled, Ibrahim will be freed.

I think the Sudanese higher court will rule in favor of appeal because there is ambiguity regarding her religious affiliation in childhood, there's a lot of negative global attention on the Sudanese legal system as a result of this case, and because her husband is a US citizen who can attract the support of politicians (either because those politicians really care, or because it looks good to US voters, or both).

[HairOfTheDog]

DEATH OR INCESTUOUS MARRIAGE -- HONOR KILLING

Farzana Parveen, 25, was murdered in broad daylight in Pakistan earlier this week.



She wasn't killed because she refused to adopt Islam or any certain religion. She was killed because she refused an arranged marriage to her cousin and instead married a man she loved, Mohammad Iqbal, 27. They married in January and she was a couple of months pregnant when she was murdered.

Her family members, including the rejected cousin, stoned her to death outside of a court where she was to testify that her marriage to Iqbal was her choice and made freely (her family had falsely claimed to the courts that she was "abducted"). Her husband was attacked and restrained by the fuckers as well -- he claims that there were police nearby, but nobody helped the couple.

Though sharia is largely supported in the country, Pakistan has a British/Indian-inspired legal system and the woman broke no laws. The Prime Minister of Pakistan has lashed out at the killers in the media and is demanding that the husband's claims be investigated. I hope all of those who beat Parveen's head in with bricks and stones are prosecuted and rot.

Police said they had arrested Parveen's father, whose name they gave only as Azeem. They said he had admitted to the killing and expressed no regret. Search warrants are out for the other men accused of attacking her.

Refs:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/...50314.html
http://edition.cnn.com/2014/05/28/world/...an-killed/

[Duchess]

I just read the the husband of the woman stoned ^^^^^^ was himself accused of murdering his first wife but the charges were dropped because her family forgave him (or accepted blood money).

How can there still be room in the world for honor killings?

Also, he's threatening to commit suicide by self-immolation in the same spot she was stoned unless her killers are brought to justice.

Story

[HairOfTheDog]

Also, he's threatening to commit suicide by self-immolation in the same spot she was stoned unless her killers are brought to justice.

Hell, based on what's been revealed about the husband, I'd lend him a match.

Snip:
The husband of Farzana Parveen, the Pakistani woman stoned to death for refusing to participate in an arranged marriage, told CNN he killed his first wife so he could marry Parveen.

Authorities said the first wife was killed six years ago.

"I wanted to send a proposal to Farzana, so I killed my wife," Mohammad Iqbal said Thursday in an interview with CNN.

Zulfiqar Hameed, district inspector general for the Punjab police, said Iqbal's son from the first marriage alerted police to the slaying six years ago.

Iqbal was arrested but later released on bail because his son forgave him, Hameed said.

The son, Aurengzeb, who is in his 20s, confirmed his father's statements to CNN. He said his father served a year in jail.

The United Nations estimates 5,000 women are murdered worldwide by family members each year in "honor killings," so named because the woman's actions are considered to have brought shame on her family. But women's advocacy groups say the crime is underreported and the figure could be around 20,000 a year.

"Most 'honor' crimes can be traced to inflexible and discriminatory attitudes about women's roles, especially around sexuality," said Rothna Begum of Human Rights Watch. "Women or couples seen as having brought 'dishonor' on the community face violence, which is then held out as a chilling example for others."

Most honor killings in the Middle East and Central Asia occur in rural areas. Tuesday's attack was unusual because it happened in a public area of a big city.

Iqbal, a neighbor of Parveen's family, said he and Parveen were supposed to marry, with the family's approval, last year. As part of the arrangement, Iqbal said, he'd given Parveen's father 80,000 rupees and gold jewelry.

Last December, Parveen's mother died and her father and brothers changed their minds about the marriage, Iqbal said.The family decided Parveen, who came from a village in Punjab, should marry a cousin, police said.

The marriage enraged her family, Iqbal said, and they demanded he pay them 100,000 rupees (about $1,000) to let the couple stay alive. Iqbal, a farmer in the village in Jurranwala, Punjab, didn't have the money.

http://us.cnn.com/2014/05/29/world/meast...?hpt=ju_c2
---------------------------------------------------------

Now I've gotta wonder if the asshole husband is pressing so hard for "justice" so that he can be paid off to "forgive" his wife's family/killers.

It's truly mind boggling to me that these practices are still taking place in the 21^st century. It probably shouldn't be.

[Duchess]

told CNN he killed his first wife so he could marry Parveen.

My jaw kinda dropped when I read that.

I have some complaints about my country but we are so lucky to live in the good ol' US of A.

[aussiefriend]

There is so much to say, it leaves me speechless, it's gruesome in the extreme. Imagine that poor woman when that mob set upon her, she must have been so terrified.

[Duchess]

I always think about the fear people feel in these types of situations. Animals in distress too :(

[Duchess]

One or the other. This woman was a given a choice, renounce her Christianity and return to Islam or die. Her response was that she was never a Muslim, she was raised a Christian from the start.

The BBC is reporting that this woman is to be freed.

[crash]

Apparently not..


SUDAN has denied a Christian Sudanese woman sentenced to hang for apostasy will be freed soon, saying quotes attributed to a foreign ministry official had been taken out of context.

Meriam Yahia Ibrahim Ishag was sentenced to death on May 15 under the Islamic sharia law that has been in place since 1983 and outlaws conversions under pain of death.

Abdullah al-Azraq, a foreign ministry undersecretary, told media outlets on Saturday that Ishag “will be freed within days in line with legal procedure that will be taken by the judiciary and the ministry of justice”.

But the foreign ministry said the release of the 27-year-old, who gave birth to a baby girl in prison on Tuesday, depended on whether a court accepted an appeal request made by her defence team.

A ministry statement said Azraq actually told media on Saturday “that the defence team of the concerned citizen has appealed the verdict ... and if the appeals court rules in her favour, she will be released”.

Azraq said “the government does not interfere in the work of the judiciary because it is an independent body”.

“Some media took what the undersecretary said out of context, changing the meaning of what he said.”

linky

[HairOfTheDog]

BROTHERLY LOVE, WITCHY CHRISTIAN POTIONS, PATERNITY TESTS...

The brother who turned in Miriam Ibrahim did an interview with CNN.



"It's one of two; if she repents and returns to our Islamic faith and to the embrace of our family then we are her family and she is ours. We are prepared to hold her dearer than the apples of our eyes. But if she refuses she should be executed."

Snip:
"Her name isn't Mariam, her name is Abrar al-Hadi. I am al-Samani al-Hadi Mohamed Abdullah (pictured above), her full -- older -- brother," al-Hadi, speaking to CNN from an Islamic Center in Omdurman, tells us as he rattles off dates and details in an attempt to prove this is the sister he grew up with.

Al-Hadi says his mother and brothers attended their sister's university graduation ceremony in Khartoum. Nothing, he says, seemed amiss.

Then, he says, she met her husband Daniel and his sister. He claims Daniel -- whom he called "the Priest" -- fed his sister "potions" to convert her to Christianity.

Daniel Wani and his wife tell a very different story. They say they were introduced through his sister in 2009 and married in 2011. Mariam, as Wani calls his wife, was a committed Christian -- attending church with a frequency that far outstripped his own.

Wani says he never saw the man claiming to be his brother-in-law until the trial began. When I put this to Al-Samani al-Hadi, he tells me: "Then she is lying to both the Christians and the Muslims."

"She went missing in Ramadan [July] last year for 45 days. That's when we went to the police. When she was picked up we found her face was different, the way she looked at us was different. She was bewitched."

"When she stood in front of the court she said her name was Mariam Yahya. We were shocked." The case dragged on for seven months, during which time they brought fingerprint and identity documentation, photocopies of which have since been disseminated to local reporters. The documents -- which the court ruled to be genuine -- purport to show that the fingerprints recorded for the national identity card issued in the name of "Abrar" at the Sudanese government registry offices were an exact match to those the court took from Mariam.

Wani is a U.S. citizen and is attempting to secure asylum there for his wife, along with citizenship for his two children (HOTD: 29 Republican and Democratic Congresspersons have appealed to the Sudanese government and President Obama for her release to the US).

That process, (her husband Danie Wani says), is being delayed by U.S. demands for paternity testing of the children. When asked by reporters earlier in the week if this was true, State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said, "Genetic testing is a useful tool for verifying a biological relationship."

Full story: http://edition.cnn.com/2014/06/05/world/...?hpt=hp_c2

[Mohammed]

It's all the French's fault!

There was a time when Kabul looked like down town Paris, when Teheran was running around in mini skirts and Austin Powers would have fit right in. When the women of Yemen ran around half naked and nobody was bothered, when getting stoned in Pakistan had a rather different meaning. But then the French gave that utter twat called Khomeini not only exile but released him upon the world with a glorious parade.

Little did they know but life as they knew it would never be the same!

[HairOfTheDog]

It's all the French's fault!

Right on, Mo -- tell it like it is, baby.

About the only things those snobby bastards are good for is manicures, kisses, fries and toast!!!

Except for the ones in Duchess' and Maggot's families, of course (and Catherine Deneuve, she defines beauty and aging with grace, IMO).

[Maggot]

It's all the French's fault!

Right on, Mo -- tell it like it is, baby.

About the only things those snobby bastards are good for is manicures, kisses, fries and toast!!!

Except for the ones in Duchess' and Maggot's families, of course (and Catherine Deneuve, she defines beauty and aging with grace, IMO).

That's OK mine are French Canadian Indian. They hate the British.