Shyman Bibi Urf Shamar and Sajjad Nasir Zurjad Nazir Nasir
Mob beat and burned a Pakistani Christian couple alive over burning a couple of Arabic language pages believed to be from a Qur'an.
By H. Nelson Goodson
November 6, 2014
Kot Radha Kishan, Pakistan - On Tuesday, a Christian couple, Shyman Bibi Urf Shamar (Shama) and her husband, Sajjad Nasir Zurjad Nazir Nasir (Shahzad) were beaten, tortured and thrown into a charcoal burning brick kiln at the village 59 near the town of Kot Radha Kishan, Punjab province in Pakistan. They were burned alive after a local cleric, Maui Muhammad Hussain found them guilty of blasphemy for burning pages of a Qur'an.
Yousaf Gujjar, the owner of the kiln where they worked had learned of the Qur'an page burning and summoned the couple to his office, where he beat the couple and locked them up in a separate room. Gujjar's son, Khawar Yousaf tried to get the couple to pay about $150,000 Pakistani rupees ($1,471 U.S.) so, they could flee from the village, but the couple couldn't afford the extortion, according to the ACL dot org.
Apparently, Shamar found some papers written in Arabic belonging to her father-in-law who had died a week earlier when she was cleaning up. She can't read, but piled the papers and began to burn them.
Several neighbors had seen Shamar burning some papers in Arabic and alleged that pages of the Qur'an were being burned and notified the local cleric. Cleric Hussain spread the word quickly to six villages and announced through loud speakers from his Mosque that the couple should be punished for burning pages of the Qur'an. About 2,000 to 3,000 people from surrounding villages went to the kiln place and demanded for Gujjar to release the couple to them. They located the couple and beat them. Then when they were unconscious, they took the couple and threw them in the hot burning kiln and place a large metal sheet on top of them to keep them from moving. The couple was burned alive. The wife was pregnant and no evidence was found later that they had committed blasphemy or desecration of the Qur'an. Five police officers who attempted to rescue the couple were also beaten. Police had learned of the allegations against the couple, but failed to act quickly because they felt nothing was going to happen to them.
In some cases, people accuse others for revenge of Qur'an desecration and are quickly put to death by mobs.
43 people who participated in the mob killing including Gujjar and Nazeer Ahmed were arrested. Both Gujjar and Ahmed are accused of being the main guilty party in the mob killing and were ordered held for four days by Anti-terrorist Court Judge Haroon Latif. Judge Latif also order the rest held for 14 days on a judicial order.
Gujjar and Ahmed are expected back in court on November 9 and the rest of the suspects on November 19.
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