Tens of thousands of Islamists rallied Sunday in Pakistan's southern port city of Karachi in support of the nation's controversial blasphemy laws, and clerics threatened to kill anyone who challenged them.
Security was tightened around the house of Sherry Rehman, a former federal minister, who was threatened with death by radical clerics for moving a bill in the parliament last month to amend the blasphemy laws, which currently sentence to death anyone found guilty of insulting Islam.
The blasphemy laws have been in the spotlight since the murder last week of Salmaan Taseer, governor of Punjab province and a critic of the laws, who was shot by a member of his security detail. The shooter, Mumtaz Qadri, later said he killed Mr. Taseer because of the politician's opposition to the laws. Mr. Taseer was a member of the Pakistan People's Party, which runs the governing coalition, and was close to President Asif Ali Zardari. ...
Speakers at the Karachi rally sought to justify Mr. Taseer's assassination, saying the killer fulfilled his obligation as a Muslim. "We will defend the assassin in the court," declared Fazalur Rehman, the leader of Jamiat-e-Ulema Islam, a radical Islamic group that recently quit the coalition government after one of its ministers was sacked after publicly accusing a cabinet colleague of corruption. ...
Mr. Taseer had provoked the ire of radical clerics for publicly supporting a Christian woman who has been sentenced to death by a Pakistani court for allegedly making derogatory remarks against Islam's prophet. The controversial laws have often been used against Christians and other non-Muslim communities, something that Ms. Rehman is seeking to prevent with a private bill she introduced last month.
A cleric of the Sultan Mosque in Karachi in his sermon on Friday called Ms. Rehman an "infidel" for suggesting changes in the blasphemy laws. A pamphlet signed by several Islamic clerics named her for supporting blasphemy. And some hard-line clerics have issued a "fatwa" demanding death to Ms. Rehman, a senior member of parliament of the Pakistan People's Party.
Islamists Rally for Pakistan's Blasphemy Laws - WSJ.com
Now, for the usual knuckle-draggers, it is Muslims in Pakistan who are dying standing up to the barbarism in their country.