MUSLIM MAJORITY
Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, The Maldives
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AFGHANISTAN
Classified as part of South Asia, Afghanistan is essentially a “fault-line” state; with everything north and west of the Hindu Kush leaning towards Persia and Central Asia, and everything south and east of the Hindu Kush leaning towards Pakistan and South Asia. It is one of the most war-ravaged and desperately needy countries in the world.
Afghanistan is today an Islamic Republic where, according to the new US-backed constitution, all laws must be consistent with Islam. Consequently, there is no religious freedom for Islamic Sharia Law bans apostasy (conversion out of Islam), blasphemy (criticism or questioning of Islam), and proselytism (sharing a faith other than Islam). What’s more, everyone is obliged to follow Islamic social norms.
2004 Constitution
Article 1
Afghanistan shall be an Islamic Republic, independent, unitary and indivisible state.
Article 2
The sacred religion of Islam is the religion of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan. Followers of other faiths shall be free within the bounds of law in the exercise and performance of their religious rituals.
Article 3
No law shall contravene the tenets and provisions of the holy religion of Islam in Afghanistan.
It is virtually impossible for a Christian to survive in Afghanistan today.
Absent security, Christians will continue to flee Afghanistan. A growing community of Afghan converts to Christianity exists in Pakistan, and more are emerging in Afghan communities throughout the Diaspora.
Recommended:
Anticipating a rough horizon
U.S. troops are leaving Afghanistan, but the war on the Afghan people, and threats to the country’s underground Christians, are staying—and growing.
By Mindy Belz, World Magazine, 19 May 2021
Excerpt:
“AMONG AFGHANISTAN’S non-Muslims are Christians who have seen a revival of faith and rapid growth since the U.S.-led liberation from the Taliban in 2001. There are basically three types of believers,” said a foreign worker in Afghanistan whom WORLD is not naming due to threats – “those who have been forced to leave the country, those who survive by exercising their faith underground, and those who are dead . . . Yet Muslims have continued to come to faith across the country.”
PAKISTAN
Recommended:
Cleansing Pakistan of Minorities
by Farahnaz Ispahani, former member, Parliament of Pakistan.
Hudson Institute, 31 July 2013.
Excerpts:
“When Pakistan was founded in 1947, its secular founding fathers wanted to create a homeland for South Asia’s Muslims, not an Islamic state. Mohammad Ali Jinnah [a Muslim from the long-persecuted Shia minority], recognized as Pakistan’s Quaid-e-Azam (Great Leader), clearly declared that non-Muslims would be equal citizens in the new country. But Pakistan’s trajectory after independence has been very different.
“At the time of partition in 1947, almost 23 percent of Pakistan’s population was comprised of non-Muslim citizens. Today, the proportion of non-Muslims has declined to approximately 3 percent. . .
“The blueprint and arguments for the steps required to transform Pakistan into an Islamic State came from Abul Ala Maududi, founder of the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), the South Asian analogue of the Arab Muslim Brotherhood. . .
“Once Pakistan’s raison d’être had been defined in religious terms, the Islamist demands could not be held at bay. . .
“General Zia ul Haq [a Sunni], Pakistan’s third military ruler who ruled from 1977-88, imposed a policy of state-led Islamization. Till the time of Zia, most Islamists believed, like Maududi, that given the opportunity any good Muslim would vote an Islamist party into power and set up an Islamic state. By the 1970s it was evident that given the choice Pakistanis, like others, voted for political parties which promised them roti, kapra, makan (food, clothing, housing). This led to what Vali Nasr refers to as the phenomenon of ‘top-down Islamization’ in countries like Malaysia and Pakistan.
“As part of this Islamization process General Zia brought in rules and regulations which were supposed to bring Pakistani law more into tune with the Sharia, or at least the Sharia as interpreted by him and his cohorts. These laws, which included the infamous blasphemy law, had a long-term impact on Pakistan’s minorities. . .”
Ispahani concludes: “The purification of Pakistan started soon after partition from India and was then institutionalized and legalized by military dictator Muhammad Zia ul-Haq. The Islamists are prevailing in the battle of ideas. Secular voices have been either physically eliminated or removed from the mainstream by judicial means. Therefore, it is in the interest of Pakistan’s neighbors and the international community to support the minority communities in Pakistan and to support the voices of those Pakistanis who refuse to give up the idea of a pluralist society.”
Pakistan’s infamous Blasphemy Law goes back to General Zia ul-Haq’s policy of “top-down Islamisation”. Section XV (15) of the Pakistan Penal Code – articles 295 through 298-C – covers “Offences Relating to Religion”. Articles 295-B and 295-C were added in 1987 and establish the penalty of death for blasphemy against Islam.
· Article 295-B Defiling, etc., of Holy Qur'an:
Whoever wilfully defiles, damages or desecrates a copy of the Holy Qu’an or of an extract therefrom or uses it in any derogatory manner or for any unlawful purpose shall be punishable with imprisonment for life.
· Article 295-C Use of derogatory remarks, etc., in respect of the Holy Prophet:
Whoever by words, either spoken or written, or by visible representation or by any imputation, innuendo, or insinuation, directly or indirectly, defiles the sacred name of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) shall be punished with death, or imprisonment for life, and shall also be liable to fine.
Muslims from the Sunni majority routinely wield the blasphemy law as a weapon, to remove opponents, eliminate competitors, grab land, and cruelly persecute religious minorities, in particular Shi’ites, Ahmadiyya’s and Christians. Most accusations are baseless, made only for personal gain. What’s more, accusations routinely trigger, and are used to justify, violent Islamic pogroms in which entire Christian communities are collectively punished, their homes looted and torched while police stand idly by.
As soon as someone is accused of blasphemy, they are arrested and jailed. They must then prove their innocence using a legal system that is totally stacked against them. Lawyers are often too afraid of radical Islamists to represent the accused. Judges are often too afraid to acquit innocent. Those who have done so, have subsequently needed to flee for their lives. Politicians who advocate for a revision of the law – in particular to ensure those who make false accusations are severely punished – have likewise been forced to flee the country.
The blasphemy law is thus a “sword of Damocles” permanently suspended over the neck of Pakistan’s religious minorities and reformers.
Recommended:
Policing Belief: The Impact of Blasphemy Laws on Human Rights
A Freedom House Special Report.
Another horrendous trend in Pakistan is the abduction, forced Islamisation and forced marriage to Muslim men, of religious minority girls. Most victims are minors, and police and local courts routinely collude with Islamists to block all efforts at redress.
Recommended:
REPORT ON Forced Marriages & Forced Conversions in the Christian Community of Pakistan
By Movement for Solidarity and Peace (MSP Inc.) Pakistan, April 2014.
Excerpt (from executive summary)
“The prevalence and incidence of forced conversion and marriage are difficult to accurately estimate due to reporting deficiencies and the complex nature of the crime. Estimates therefore range from 100 to 700 victim Christian girls per year. For the Hindu community, the most conservative estimates put the number of victims at 300 per year.”
Example:
Pakistan: A Cry for Justice
By Elizabeth Kendal, 4 Nov 2020
Excerpt:
“Not all [victims] are minors and not all are abducted. Some girls and parents are groomed, until they reluctantly become convinced it is the only way to escape poverty and persecution. By this means Christian and Hindu girls are either lured or trafficked from their own community into the Muslim community where they are exploited, abused and forced to produce Muslim babies.”
Also:
Pakistan: Abduction, Conversion and Child Marriage of Religious Minority Girls
By Jubilee Campaign, November 2020
Excerpts:
“The police generally hold negative bias towards Christians due to the Islamic thought which permeates society . . . The police often refuse to file a First Information Report (FIR), and sometimes they falsify information, obstructing the families from getting their daughters back. When documentation is shown which prove that the girl is under 18 years, the police often disregard such evidence. . .
“In the exceedingly rare situation that the girls from religious minorities are returned to their families, the families and the girls are heavily pressured to drop the charges against their kidnappers. There is no criminal penalty for forced conversion outlined in the Pakistan Penal Code . . . the abductors of religious minority girls are rarely ever punished, thus allowing the crimes to be continuously perpetuated with impunity.”
Compounding the problem of radicalisation and intolerance is the fact that Pakistan has more than 35,000 Islamic madrasas. While many have long been keen to “mainstream”, hard-line clerics wielding phenomenal and fearsome “street power” repeatedly derail all efforts. Any Pakistani government brave enough to pursue madrassa reform deserves all the support it can get.
BANGLADESH
In 1971, East Pakistan’s long-marginalised and more secular ethnic Bengalis fought a bloody Liberation War against increasingly Islamist, racist and belligerent West Pakistan. The result was an independent Bangladesh.
However, as the nation’s secular roots have eroded, so too have liberty and rule of law. Muslim persecution of religious minorities – i.e. Hindus and Christians – and non-Bengali Pharsis (indigenous hills tribes) has escalated markedly.
The non-Bengali Pharsis of the Chittagong Hills Tracts – many of whom are Christian, and who have more in common with East India’s Mizo than with Bengali Muslims – are victims of predatory mass migration (i.e. state-sanctioned colonisation), Islamisation, military violence and other gross human rights abuses.
See:
Hidden Genocide in Chittagong Hill Tracts
By Elizabeth Kendal, 8 Feb 2017
THE MALDIVES
Five hundred kilometres south-west of the southern-most tip of India is a series of coral atolls. Looking like a patch of emerald sequins, the Republic of Maldives stretches 885km across the Indian Ocean.
Extravagantly beautiful, known for its luxury and elite tourism, the Republic of Maldives has long been one of the world’s most repressive Islamic police states. Just like its patron, Saudi Arabia, the Maldives boasts of being 100 percent Muslim. But just like its patron, it isn’t!
Some dozens of Maldivians became Christians through the late 1980s and 1990s after Christian literature and gospel radio (broadcast from Seychelles) became available in the national language, Dhivehi.
In June 1998, up to 50 local Christians were arrested, imprisoned and tortured in the notorious political prison of Dhoonidhoo, a tiny island close to the capital of Male. Arrested simply for being Christian, while in prison they were under intense pressure to participate in Islamic rituals and return to Islam. As a result of loud international protest, the Christian prisoners were released in November that year.
Up to 25 foreign workers also were detained and their possessions confiscated before they were expelled from the country on allegations of missionary activity.
Despite immense hardship and risk, a Maldivian Christian community continues to exist and grow, albeit deep “underground”.
On Thursday 7 August 2008, President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom ratified Maldives’ new Constitution to much fanfare from the Western media which applauded the government for its embrace of democratic reforms.
Clearly the Western media still regard religious liberty as a dispensable human right, for the new constitution discriminates against and marginalises non-Muslims, offers no guarantee of religious freedom, elevates Sharia (Islamic Law) as the supreme authority, and iterates that the rights and freedoms specified by the Constitution may be limited by law to protect the tenets of Islam.
See:
The Republic of the Maldives, 2008 Constitution
Analysis:
Religious Liberty Absent from New Constitution.
By Elizabeth Kendal, Religious Liberty Monitoring, 12 August 2008
Since then, radical Islam has grown stronger and stronger due largely to the influence of Saudi Arabia. What’s more, hundreds of Maldivians who fought with Islamic jihadists in Syria have returned and are threatening to wreak havoc.
See:
Covid-19 sows Islamic trouble in Maldives paradise
Tourism-dependent island nation threatens to become a hotbed of religious extremism as economic desperation sets in.
By Bertil Lintner, Asia Times, 5 April 2020
On 16 April 2020, Islamic State claimed its first attack in the Maldives.
Then, on the night of Thursday 6 May 2021, former Maldives President Mohamed Nasheed (53) narrowly survived an assassination attempt in the capital Male when a homemade explosive attached to a motorcycle was detonated beside Mr Nasheed’s car. Suffering critical injuries to his head, chest, abdomen and limbs, Mr Nasheed was airlifted to Germany for further treatment.
In 2008, Mr Nasheed became the Maldives’ first democratically elected president, only to be ousted in a coup four years later. He has long been an outspoken critic of hard-line Islamists and of Islamisation in the Maldives.
The trend bodes ill for Maldivian Christians.