Paul KeenanThreats had been issued by fundamentalists
A lawyer engaged in defending a man accused of blasphemy has been shot dead at his offices in the Pakistani city of Multan.
Rashid Rehman, who was also co-ordinator of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan was working with two assistants when gunmen opened fire indiscriminately in the May 7 attack. The lawyer’s assistants were injured.
Rehman had received death threats after he had agreed to take the case of Junaid Hafeez, a university lecturer accused by a student group of making insulting remarks about the Prophet Mohammad. Numerous lawyers had previously refused to accept the case.
Meanwhile, after four postponements, imprisoned Pakistani Christian Asia Bibi has been informed that May 27 has been scheduled for the ongoing appeal against her blasphemy conviction.
Ms Bibi has now spent four years in prison under threat of death from fundamentalists who disagree with the commuting of her death sentence in favour of a life tariff after a questionable conviction under Pakistan’s blasphemy laws. Observers have suggested that the same fundamentalists have been the cause of the repeat postponements of her appeal hearings, threatening anyone, including members of the judiciary, perceived as assisting someone who has insulted Islam.