A Chinese engineer working at the Dasu hydropower project in Kohistan District in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province has become the latest victim of Pakistan’s strict blasphemy laws. He was arrested on Sunday evening for “Insulting Allah.”
The incident occurred at the project when an employee of China Gezhouba Group Company working at the site got into a heated argument with local labourers. The quarrel broke out over the slow pace of work during Ramadan, the Islamic month of fasting, reported SCMP citing a source by This Week in Asia.
As per reports, during the squabble, the Chinese employee allegedly insulted “Allah.” Over this, a few enraged workers assembled in front of the engineer’s office on Sunday with the apparent intention to assault him.
A member of the local citizen-police liaison committee told This Week in Asia that police in northern Pakistan have taken a Chinese engineer into custody from a worksite camp at the Dasu hydropower project.
The police made the arrest “to avert a serious situation”, as per the member. A police station in the rural Kohistan region of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province is where the Chinese national was reportedly being held, according to the source.
Once the news reached nearby areas, hundreds of protesters blocked Karakoram Highway (KKH) between the China-Pakistan border in a mark of their demonstrations against the Chinese citizen working at Dassu dam project. Police officers and paramilitary troops tasked with protecting Chinese nationals working on the dam had to stop the yelling throng.
According to unconfirmed accounts, troops fired warning bullets into the air to quell the crowd. After nearly four hours when authorities had given community leaders assurances that the Chinese engineer would face legal repercussions, the demonstrators dispersed.
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Reports suggest that local religious leaders will conduct a tribal council on Monday to determine whether to file a blasphemy charge with the police.
Pakistan’s blasphemy laws were first introduced in the 1980s, and have been controversial ever since. The blasphemy laws have also been criticised by human rights organisations and international bodies, including the United Nations. These organisations argue that the laws violate freedom of expression and religion, and have called for their repeal or reform.
Despite the controversy surrounding the blasphemy laws, they remain in place in Pakistan, and continue to be enforced.
The subject of the security of Chinese nationals in Pakistan has also been scrutinised lately. In 2021, at least 12 persons, including nine Chinese engineers and two Frontier Corps personnel were killed in a bus “attack” near the Dasu hydropower plant in the Upper Kohistan district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Last year, three Chinese teachers and their Pakistani driver were killed in a suicide bombing in Karachi.
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