Security risk: ‘Jailed blasphemy accused under threat’

Militants planning to launch suicide attack at Aasia Bibi's prison, intelligence reports say.

LAHORE: A group of militants is planning to launch a suicide attack at the prison where Christian blasphemy convict Aasia Bibi is being held, according to an intelligence report issued last week, The Express Tribune has learnt.

Aasia Bibi is being kept in the Sheikhupura district Jail, where the Punjab police and jail authorities have beefed up security following this report and the murder of former Punjab governor Salmaan Taseer. The terrorist group, according to the intelligence report, calls itself “Moaviya group”.

According to official figures, 131 people are being held in jails across Punjab on blasphemy charges. Eleven of them have been sentenced to death, including Aasia Bibi.

As many as 35 people, who were accused of committing blasphemy or defending them, have been killed between 1990 and 2011, including Taseer. They were all killed in either extra judicial killings or found dead in prison under dubious circumstances.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 6^th, 2011.