Christians in Pakistan Celebrate Easter amid Blasphemy Fears

As Christians in Pakistan celebrated Holy Week and Easter, many say they are fearful over a new blasphemy charge that has triggered violence against the tiny Christian minority in the Punjab province.

A blasphemy charge was made on April 1 accusing an 11-year-old Christian boy and four other Christians, including his relatives, of blasphemy by desecrating a sacred band with inscriptions from the Koran worn by a Muslim boy, who worked for a rival television cable operator to one of the Christians. Christians there are calling it a trumped up claim.

"We Christians are worried. We are appealing to the government to ensure the safety of Christians and to drop the false blasphemy charge," Victor Azariah, general secretary of the National Council of Churches of Pakistan told Ecumenical News International.

According to the National Council of Churches in Pakistan, a grouping of four of the country's Protestant churches, said there was tension and that violence had been meted out to Christians in the Toba Tek Singh district of Punjab province following the charge.

Blasphemy is punishable by death under the laws of overwhelmingly Muslim Pakistan, although nobody has been executed for it. Courts have acquitted those accused of blasphemy in more than 100 cases after overruling lower courts but 20 people facing blasphemy charges, including six Christians, have been killed during their trials. Most Christians acquitted of blasphemy flee Pakistan, and Christians there remain unnerved after the murder of a judge who ruled for an acquittal in one blasphemy case.

"Once a blasphemy case is registered anything could happen. The Christians there are really worried," said Azariah.