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Relief denied to the four Ahmadi children incarcerated for months on false accusation of blasphemy

Layyah: Four Ahmadi school children and an adult were arrested in January 2009 in District Layyah in a fabricated case of blasphemy. There is no evidence, and no witness to the involvement of the accused in the incident.

Extremist mullas made it an issue and threatened agitation. Self-seeking politicians decided to support them. The police found it convenient to arrest the accused despite absence of evidence against them. Well-known human rights NGOs acted fast, made on-the-spot inquiries and found no substance in accusation against the five Ahmadis. They said that in their published reports.

The children remained behind bars for months. On every court appearance, the police requested extension in Judicial Remand which the court granted. The accused thought that this was perhaps to let the extremists’ temperature cool down.

It is now learnt that Mr. Sadaqat Ullah Niazi, the Additional Session Judge Layyah, on June 12, 2009, finally decided to refuse the accused’s plea for release on bail.

The children will now continue to suffer in prison for a crime they did not commit. In their tender age they have to endure severe hardship of Pakistani prison in extreme hot summer, even when they have not been tried and found guilty. Obviously the state continues to sustain and nourish extremism, despite its own suffering and agony at the hand of extremists.

The children need help in this environment of suicidal dissolution.