Pakistan: Peaceful muslims charge three Christians with blasphemy, accuse them of burning Qur’an pages

[duluxe]

https://www.christianpost.com/news/...-to-study-quran-if-govs-plans-move-ahead.html


Three young Christians in northeastern Pakistan have been charged with blasphemy after area Muslims alleged that pages of the Quran had been burned near some Christian homes to hurt the religious sentiments of Muslims, according to a report.

Police charged the three Christians, identified as Azeem Mehmood, Abbas Gulshan, and Irfan Saleem, from a village named Kotli Muhammad Sadique in Punjab Province’s Narowal district, on Dec. 30, the U.K.-based group Centre for Legal Aid, Assistance and Settlement, known as CLAAS, learned recently.

A court sent Mehmood, who is a member of the Pakistani Army, to judicial custody while it granted bail to the other two Christians, CLAAS said in a statement, adding that while Mehmood was arrested on Dec. 25, Gulshan and Saleem were arrested on Dec. 29.

After the Christmas service, when the congregation of United Presbyterian Church was holding a procession around the church, a large number of policemen arrived. An officer said they had received a complaint that some people had burned pages of the Quran and they were there to investigate the matter.

Some local Muslims who were standing near the church took the police to an ash pile near the homes of Christians. There are about 40 Christian houses near the church.

Shahzad Masih, an uncle of Gulshan and Saleem, was quoted as saying that some local Muslims found the burned pieces of a blue letterbox, which had purportedly been installed on the wall to collect pages containing Quranic verses, near the Christians’ homes.

A local Christian, identified as Ilyas Masih, allegedly told police that he had seen some young men around the fire but he wasn’t able to see their faces due to thick fog. After Friday prayers at a mosque the same day, a large angry mob of Muslims from surrounding villages gathered in the village, demanding the immediate arrest of all Christians.

Local Christians believe that police tortured Ilyas Masih to force him to admit to seeing the faces of all three Christians so that the arrests could be made to placate area Muslims.

Mehmood’s wife, Marriam, was quoted as saying that her husband never left the house on Dec. 24 or Dec. 25.

Mehmood’s brother, Griffin, said that Mehmood had a dispute with Ilyas Masih before he was accused of blasphemy….