ACS, increase in cases of kidnappings and forced marriages of Christian minors in Pakistan.
Over 30 humanitarian organizations in Pakistan, including the Justice and Peace Commission of the local Conference Episcopal, supported by the pontifical foundation Aid to the Church in Need (ACS), they urged the Government to take into serious consideration the latest data on episodes of forced conversion. The number of cases is indeed increasing at an alarming rate. In a report presented to United Nations Human Rights Council a July, Center for the Social Justice based in Lahore, reported 78 officially reported episodes of forced conversion in 2021, but according to local ACS sources the number of cases would be greatly underestimated due to under-reporting.
One case involved the fourteen Christian Mehwish Bibi, kidnapped by a Muslim neighbor who forcibly converted her toIslam and he married her. Bibi has come a long way sinceOctober 2021, when a court granted her a divorce from Muhammad Imran, a man on the forties, based on his “harsh behavior and cruel". The nightmare of the months spent in her captivity still haunts this girl, daughter of a poor Christian couple from Sheikhupura, About 20 miles from Lahore. The August 4th, 2021 Imran offered her a ride to work. “After accepting, she offered me a drink with something in it, and I don't know what happened afterwards,” says Bibi. She was taken to Sargodha, 85 miles from his home village, and kept inside a van. A week later, Imran produced documents of her alleged conversion and her marriage to him in a local court.
His parents then asked for help Christians' True Spirit (CTS), a Lahore-based organization, which filed for dissolution of marriage at Family Court. Bibi has been living in a CTS shelter for almost un year. Located in a busy bazaar, the two-story building houses girls and women aged between 13 and 60 years. Although she is safe now, she is often troubled by nightmares. Last year Aghania Rafaqat, a trained psychologist working with the CTS, began holding bi-weekly sessions with Bibi and the other residents. “My unfortunate patients have different behaviors. Some become aggressive and have frequent crying fits. They feel deep sadness and are very anxious about their future. Nightmares often lead to phobias,” says Rafaqat.
La fourteen Shumaim Lazir she was kidnapped for three: days and raped by two Muslims last January a Rahwali, a small town in 63 miles north of Lahore. A man of 36 years ago he was reported and is in prison, while the other suspect is still at large. “He wanted to marry me, but I didn't want to leave my faith. When he learned of the police raids in the area, one night he let me go near my house, threatening to kill me if I reported it,” says Lazir. In the CTS shelter he has learned to be a seamstress in recent months.
The CTS also hosts 15 students of St. Joseph's Girls High School of Lahore, a Catholic school run by Sisters of Charity of Jesus and Mary. Between them 5 Christian daughters of women forcibly converted to Islam e 10 girls who worked in brick kilns. Among the latter there is Sara Fayaz, 12 years old, born to a Christian mother and a Muslim father. After Fayaz was raped by her father, her mother was also kidnapped in 2007 and converted to Islam, took Fayaz with her and fled from Islamabad. Her younger sister was also raped by one of her cousins. “My father beat my mother,” the sixth-grader recalls, tears in her eyes, but she is determined to become a doctor to help others.
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