Save Abdul Rahman

Yesterday, I blogged about Abdul Rahman, a Muslim-born Christian man in Afghanistan who is being threatened with execution for his conversion to Christianity. Michelle Malkin continues to follow the story:

The NYSun headlined the story on the front page today and blogs are all over it, but most of the MSM is ignoring the case.

Michelle then goes on to quote ABC News:

Despite the overthrow of the fundamentalist Taliban government and the presence of 22,500 U.S. troops in Afghanistan, a man who converted to Christianity is being prosecuted in Kabul, and a judge said Sunday that if convicted, he faces the death penalty.

Abdul Rahman, who is in his 40s, says he converted to Christianity 16 years ago while working as an aid worker helping Afghan refugees in Pakistan. Relatives denounced him as a convert during a custody battle over his children, and he was arrested last month. The prosecutor says Rahman was found with a Bible.

Human rights workers have described the case as an unsettling reminder that the country's post-Taliban judiciary remains deeply conservative, and they have called on President Hamid Karzai to intervene. During Taliban times, men were forced to kneel in prayer five times a day, and couples faced the death penalty for sex outside marriage, for example. Reform efforts have been slow, say experts, since there are so few judges and lawyers with experience.

The U.S. State Department is watching the case closely and considers it a barometer of how well democracy is developing in Afghanistan. "Our view … is that tolerance, freedom of worship is an important element of any democracy," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said. "And these are issues as Afghan democracy matures that they are going to have to deal with increasingly."

A number of Christian nonprofit groups do humanitarian work in Afghanistan. Dominic Nutt of Christian Aid calls the Rahman case a step backward for the country, especially if Rahman is executed. Nutt, who has spent time in Afghanistan, tells ABC News "few practitioners are used to the concept of democracy and toleration … [many] are educated only in Islamic law."

And Junkyard Blog:

Mr. Rahman’s plight deserves attention. He deserves religious freedom. Afghans deserve freedom to woship as they please and should not be subject to the laws of a religion they don’t serve. Writing Islam into Afghanistan’s constitution—and Iraq’s—may yet undo all the good work our troops have done in both.

Michelle also gives this contact info for those wanting to take action:

Write the embassy of Afghanistan:

Ambassador Said T. Jawad
Embassy of Afghanistan
2341 Wyoming Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20008
info@embassyofafghanistan.org

Contact the State Department:

U.S. Department of State
2201 C Street NW
Washington, DC 20520

Main Switchboard:
202-647-4000

Sign a petition supporting Rahman. And here's an e-mail campaign to President Bush.

Read the rest of Michelle’s post and please do what you can to spread the word and put pressure on our politicians to take a stand for Abdul Rahman’s life and liberty.

Also be sure to read this letter from Brian Mattson that was published in the Kabul Times:

Dear Editor,

I am writing to express my extreme displeasure and that of many other Americans regarding the trial of Abdul Rahman, taking place presently in Kabul. As I understand it, Mr. Rahman faces possible execution for the simple "crime" of converting to Christianity. Fundamental to any free and democratic society - for which, I might note, brave Americans have spilled blood on Afghani soil - is the freedom of individual conscience. It is intolerable that a state that wishes friendly terms with the United States of America should maintain standards of ideological totalitarianism that warrant death for merely claiming the name of Jesus Christ.

This is an injustice. Abdul Rahman must be exonerated immediately, and Afghanistan must end this barbaric practice of murdering converts to Christianity. Whatever appropriateness or popularity the practice may have seemed to possess in the 7th century is decidedly outdated.

Sincerely,

Brian G. Mattson
Proud Citizen, U.S.A.

More on this here and here.

Also, some of the Christian sites are also starting to cover this here, here and here

Here’s the latest from Google News.

Please continue to pray for Abdul Rahman and Afghanistan. I hate to think what direction their country will head if he is sentenced to execution.

P.S. -- More great thoughts on this from the ever-excellent Joe Carter on the evangelical outpost:

“The customer can have any color he wants,” Henry Ford once said, referring to his Model T, “as long as it’s black.” Apparently Afghanistan, a country we recently liberated from oppression, is taking Mr. Ford’s approach when it comes to religious freedom. Afghans can have any religion they want…as long as it’s Islam.

According to the BBC, an Afghan man is being tried for converting from Islam to Christianity. Abdul Rahman, who could be sentenced to death for his “crime”, allegedly confessed to the authorities that he converted to Christianity when he was 25. Prosecutors offered to drop the charges if Rahman agreed to reaffirm a belief in Islam, but he refused. He now faces execution if convicted under Sharia law.

I wish I could say that I'm shocked by this tragic injustice. But over two years ago I warned of the threat to religious liberty posed by the newly drafted Afghani constitution (Creating Taliban-Lite and Fisking a Constitution). At the time, the White House was issuing a mealy-mouthed statement ("The United States takes note...of the draft...") while another government agency had the courage to say what the document was creating: Taliban-lite.

Did American troops give their lives removing the repressive Taliban government only for us to replace it with Taliban-lite? Will we once again remain silent as a government we helped to install executes a man for his religious beliefs?

"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil,” said Edmund Burke, “is that good men do nothing.” We did nothing to stop the adoption of a theocratic constitution, believing at the time it was a “necessary evil.” Will we continue to do nothing and allow evil to triumph?

Read the whole thing!