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Pakistan: Islamic Cleric Arrested in Mob Attack on Christians
By Joseph DeCaro, Worthy News Correspondent
(Worthy News) - An Islamist cleric was taken into custody Friday by Pakistani police for inciting a Muslim mob to harm a Christian couple for desecrating the Quran.
According to Morning Star News, hundreds of Muslims in Makki village in Sheikhupura District had attacked Owais Qamar and his wife Rukhsana after a neighbor complained that they were sleeping on a sign bearing a Quranic verse.
Islamic clerics broadcasting from a local mosque were quick to announce that Qamar had indeed desecrated the Koran. Muslims then beat and dragged Qamar through the village streets before police intervened and handed the couple over to local Christian elders.
Sheikhupura Senior Superintendent of Police Sohail Chattha told Morning Star News that he had ordered his officers to rescue the Christian couple even if it meant opening fire on the Muslim mob.
Although the clerics leading the mob demanded that police arrest the couple and charge them with blasphemy, Chattha instead registered a case against the clerics and 400 others for inciting violence and endangering the lives of the Christian couple!
In Pakistan, blasphemy is punishable by death even though its penal code does not clearly define what is blasphemous.