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Puck
The Texan
Joined: 05 Jan 2004
Posts: 5596
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 Tue Mar 21, 2006 8:59 pm US Backs Afghan Man On Trial for Converting to Christianity |
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| Quote: | U.S. Backs Afghan Man Who Converted to Christianity
WASHINGTON � The Bush administration issued a subdued appeal Tuesday to Afghanistan to permit a Christian convert on trial for his life to practice his faith in the predominantly Muslim country.
The State Department, however, did not urge the U.S. ally in the war against terrorism to terminate the trial. Officials said the Bush administration did not want to interfere with Afghanistan's sovereignty.
The case involves an Afghan man who converted from Islam and was arrested last month after his family accused him of becoming a Christian. The conversion is a crime under Afghanistan's Islamic laws.
Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns and department spokesman Sean McCormack asked Afghanistan to conduct the trial "in a transparent way." Burns said he told Afghan Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah, with whom he held talks at the department, that "we would follow the case closely."
At a joint news conference, pressed by reporters, Abdullah said he hoped "through our constitutional process there will be a satisfactory result." He did not say whether the defendant, Abdul Rahman, 41, would be found innocent.
Abdullah said officials of his government "know that it is a very sensitive issue and we know the concerns of the American people." He said the Afghan Embassy in Washington had received hundreds of messages of concern.
The Bush administration went to war four years ago, ousting the Taliban rulers in Afghanistan, and then joined with other countries to help steer the nation to constitutional rule. About 18,000 U.S. troops are on duty there, and more than 200 have died.
"Our government is a great supporter of freedom of religion," Burns said. "As the Afghan constitution affords freedom of religion to all Afghan citizens, we hope very much that those rights, the right of freedom of religion, will be upheld in an Afghan court."
Rep. Tom Lantos, D-Calif., released a letter he said he had sent to Afghan President Hamid Karzai expressing dismay over the case.
"In a country where soldiers from all faiths, including Christianity, are dying in defense of your government, I find it outrageous that Mr. Rahman is being prosecuted and facing the death penalty for converting to Christianity, which he did 16 years ago before your government even existed," Lantos wrote.
German and Italian officials have voiced concern, too.
State Department spokesman McCormack contrasted the government in Kabul with its fundamentalist predecessor.
"Under the Taliban, anybody considered an apostate was subject to torture and death," he said. "Right now, you have a legal proceeding that is under way in Afghanistan."
McCormack said the administration underscored to Abdullah "that we believe tolerance and freedom of worship are important elements of any democracy.
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Theresa
Lux Mihi Deus
Joined: 17 Jun 2001
Posts: 27256
Location: United States of America
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| Tue Mar 21, 2006 9:49 pm |
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It's probably our fault anyway, 
But good.
-------signature-------
Some of us fall by the wayside
And some of us soar to the stars
And some of us sail through our troubles
And some have to live with our scars
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Jeremy
J's Guy
Joined: 03 Oct 2002
Posts: 7823
Location: Aberdeen, Scotland
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| Fri Mar 24, 2006 4:00 pm |
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The scary thing is most don't make it to trial. I was talking to someone who had come back from Afganistan, and they said most people who do convert have to flee the country or they are killed by family or neighbours, 
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Theresa
Lux Mihi Deus
Joined: 17 Jun 2001
Posts: 27256
Location: United States of America
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| Sun Mar 26, 2006 11:48 am |
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The charges have been dropped. I'll post the article unless someone gets to it before me.
Here we go.
| Quote: | KABUL, Afghanistan (March 26) - An Afghan court on Sunday dismissed a case against a man who converted from Islam to Christianity because of a lack of evidence and he will be released soon, officials said.
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The announcement came as U.S.-backed President Hamid Karzai faced mounting foreign pressure to free Abdul Rahman, a move that risked angering Muslim clerics here who have called for him to be killed.
An official closely involved with the case told The Associated Press that it had been returned to the prosecutors for more investigation, but that in the meantime, Rahman would be released.
"The court dismissed today the case against Abdul Rahman for a lack of information and a lot of legal gaps in the case," the official said Sunday, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter.
"The decision about his release will be taken possibly tomorrow," the official added. "They don't have to keep him in jail while the attorney general is looking into the case."
Abdul Wakil Omeri, a spokesman for the Supreme Court, confirmed that the case had been dismissed because of "problems with the prosecutors' evidence."
He said several of Rahman's family members have testified that the 41-year-old has mental problems. "It is the job of the attorney general's office to decide if he is mentally fit to stand trial," he told AP.
A Western diplomat, also declining to be identified because of the sensitivity of the case, said questions were being raised as to whether Rahman would stay in Afghanistan or go into exile in a foreign country.
"I am serene. I have full awareness of what I have chosen. If I must die, I will die."
-Abdul Rahman, prior to his case being overturned
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said she could not confirm that an Afghan court had dismissed the case and stressed the U.S. needs to respect the sovereignty of Afghanistan, which she called a "young democracy."
"We have our history of conflicts that had to be worked out after a new constitution. And so the Afghans are working on it. But America has stood solidly for religious freedom as a bedrock, the bedrock, of democracy, and we'll see." Rice said Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press."
Asked if American Christian missionaries should be encouraged to go to Afghanistan, Rice said: "I think that Afghans are pleased to get the help that they can get" but added "we need to be respectful of Afghan sovereignty."
Rahman has been prosecuted under Afghanistan's Islamic laws for converting 16 years ago while working as a medical aid worker for an international Christian group helping Afghan refugees in Pakistan. He was arrested last month and charged with apostasy.
Muslim clerics had threatened to incite Afghans to kill Rahman if the government freed him. They said he clearly violated Islamic Shariah law by rejecting Islam.
The case against Rahman put Karzai in an awkward position.
While the U.S., Britain and other countries that prop-up his government have demanded the trial be dropped, Karzai has had to be careful not to offend Islamic sensibilities at home and alienate religious conservatives who wield considerable power.
Rahman had been held at a detention facility in central Kabul since his arrest, but he was moved to the notorious Policharki Prison just outside Kabul on Friday after threats were made against him by other inmates, prison warden Gen. Shahmir Amirpur told AP.
Policharki, a high-security prison housing some 2,000 inmates, including about 350 Taliban and al-Qaida militants who were blamed for inciting a riot there late last month that killed six people.
"We are watching him constantly. This is a very sensitive case so he needs high security," he said in an interview in his office in a crumbling building inside the jail.
Rahman is being held in a cell by himself next to the office of a senior prison guard, the warden said. He showed the AP the outside of Rahman's cell door, but refused to allow reporters to speak to him or see him.
He said Rahman had been asking guards for a Bible but that they did not have any to give him.
Rahman, meanwhile, said he was fully aware of his choice and was ready to die for it, according to an interview published Sunday in an Italian newspaper La Repubblica.
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"I am serene. I have full awareness of what I have chosen. If I must die, I will die," Abdul Rahman told the Rome daily, responding to questions sent to him via a human rights worker who visited him in prison.
"Somebody, a long time ago, did it for all of us," he added in a clear reference to Jesus.
Rahman also told the Italian newspaper that his family -- including his ex-wife and teenage daughters -- reported him to the authorities three weeks ago.
He said he made his choice to become a Christian "in small steps," after he left Afghanistan 16 years ago. He moved to Pakistan, then Germany. He tried to get a visa in Belgium.
"In Peshawar I worked for a humanitarian organization. They were Catholics," Rahman said. "I started talking to them about religion, I read the Bible, it opened my heart and my mind."
03-26-06 09:31 EST
Copyright 2006 The Associated Press. |
-------signature-------
Some of us fall by the wayside
And some of us soar to the stars
And some of us sail through our troubles
And some have to live with our scars
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