Badshahi Mosque in Lahore, Pakistan. (Screenshot from YouTube)
LAHORE, Pakistan (Christian Every day Worldwide–Morning Star Information) – After a number of setbacks for a Christian household in Pakistan striving to get better their forcibly married/transformed 13-year-old daughter, a federal court docket on Friday (Jan. 9) ordered police to search out and current her and the Muslim who kidnapped her, sources mentioned.
A two-judge bench of the newly constituted Federal Constitutional Court docket (FCC) ordered police to current in court docket Maria Shahbaz and 30-year-old Shehryar Ahmad earlier than Friday (Jan. 16). Ahmad kidnapped her on July 29, forcibly transformed her to Islam and married her, Supreme Court docket Legal professional Rana Abdul Hameed mentioned. Justice Ali Baqar Najafi and Justice Karim Khan Agha admitted the petition by Shahbaz Masih, Maria’s father.
“After our petitions for the kid’s restoration have been rejected by the classes court docket in Lahore and the Lahore Excessive Court docket, we determined to problem these choices earlier than the FCC,” Hameed advised Christian Every day Worldwide-Morning Star Information. “We knowledgeable the court docket that the lady is a minor and is being subjected to rape below the guise of Islamic conversion and marriage.”
Lahore police colluded with the suspect, main a Justice of the Peace’s court docket to discharge the household’s abduction grievance, Hameed mentioned.
“The lady was compelled to report an announcement claiming she had willingly transformed to Islam and married Ahmad,” he mentioned. “She additionally falsely said that she was an grownup, regardless of official documentary proof proving that she is a minor and beneath the authorized age of marriage below provincial youngster marriage legal guidelines, which prohibit the wedding of ladies below 16.”
Rights activist Safdar Chaudhry welcomed the court docket’s order, saying that regardless of repeated setbacks in Lahore courts, the Masih household had remained steadfast in its pursuit of justice.
“We repeatedly petitioned the courts, arguing that the lady was a minor and couldn’t be allowed to stay within the custody of the accused, however our pleas have been rejected solely on the premise of the kid’s assertion earlier than a Justice of the Peace,” Chaudhry mentioned. “We’re grateful to the FCC judges for admitting our authorized arguments and ordering the kid’s manufacturing in court docket. We’re hopeful that the court docket will take discover of the violation of kid marriage legal guidelines and order authorized motion towards the accused.”
Chaudhry, additionally chairman of Raah-e-Nijaat Ministry, is helping the Masih household within the authorized battle.
Masih, a driver and father of 5, mentioned that his neighbor, Ahmad, kidnapped his daughter when she stepped exterior their residence to go to a close-by store. Masih filed a First Data Report (FIR) with Nawab City Police Station in Lahore, however on Aug. 1 police knowledgeable him that Maria had recorded an announcement on July 31 earlier than Mannequin City Judicial Justice of the Peace Hassan Sarfaraz Cheema claiming she had transformed to Islam and married Ahmad of her personal free will.
Rights advocates say such circumstances observe a well-known sample in Pakistan, the place kidnapped ladies, some as younger as 10, are kidnapped, forcibly transformed to Islam, and raped below the duvet of Islamic “marriages.” Victims are sometimes pressured to report false statements in favor of their abductors, whereas judges routinely ignore documentary proof of age and return the youngsters to their kidnappers as “authorized wives.”
Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari on Could 29 signed into regulation a landmark invoice geared toward curbing youngster marriage within the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT), setting the minimal marriage age at 18 for each genders. The regulation was enacted regardless of fierce opposition from Islamist teams, together with the Council of Islamic Ideology (CII), the nation’s high Islamic physique.
The CII declared that classifying marriage below the age of 18 as rape didn’t conform to sharia (Islamic regulation).
An identical invoice has been pending within the Punjab Provincial Meeting since April 25, 2024. In Punjab, the minimal authorized age of marriage for women stays 16. Nationally, the Christian Marriage (Modification) Act 2024 raised the marriageable age to 18 just for Christians; nonetheless, if Christian ladies convert to Islam, they’re handled as Muslims below sharia, which permits marriage at a youthful age.
Pakistan, the place greater than 96 p.c of the inhabitants is Muslim, ranked eighth on Open Doorways’ 2026 World Watch Checklist of probably the most troublesome nations through which to be a Christian.
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The put up Court docket in Pakistan Orders Restoration of Kidnapped Christian Woman appeared first on Morningstar Information.
