ICC Note:

Pakistani Christians said Shamim Bibi, 26, has been falsely accused of blasphemy after she was detained at her home in Khichiwala village in Pakistan’s Punjab province on February 28, BosNewsLife reports.

5/1/2012 Pakistan (BosNewsLife)– There was concern Tuesday, May 1, over the situation of a young Pakistani mother who local Christians said has been “falsely accused” of “blaspheming” Islam’s Prophet Muhammad.

Shamim Bibi, 26, was detained February 28 at her home in Khichiwala village in Pakistan’s Punjab province and has since been held behind bars, explained The Voice, a group providing legal assistance to “persecuted Christians” in Pakistan.

Police in the provincial Bahawalnagar district charged Shamim, a mother of a five-month-old girl, after neighbours accused her of uttering remarks against the Prophet Muhammad, rights investigators said.

In Pakistan, such an act is punishable by life imprisonment or death under internationally cricized blasphemy legislation.

Her husband, Bashir Masih, and other family members have reportedly said that the young woman was “trapped in the case” by relatives who opposed her devotion to Christianity and refusal to embrace Islam.

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