The Africa Office of World Mission has asked us to let you know about the situation of Meriam Yehya Ibrahim, a Christian Sudanese woman who is a prisoner of conscience charged with apostasy and adultery. She is pregnant and imprisoned along with her 20 month old son.
Please contact the officials listed below and urge them release her immediately and unconditionally.
Treating adultery and apostasy as criminal offences is not consistent with international human rights law – including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights – to which Sudan is a state party. The criminalization of adultery violates the rights to freedom of expression and association and invariably discriminates against women in its enforcement. The criminalization of apostasy is incompatible with the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion. Meriam Ibrahim is a prisoner of conscience, convicted solely because of her religious beliefs and identity, and must be released immediately and unconditionally.
Please contact the officials listed below and urge her release.
URGENT ACTION: Urge the Release of Sudanese Christian Prisoner of Conscience
Meriam Yehya Ibrahim, a Christian Sudanese woman, was
convicted on charges of 'adultery' and 'apostasy' and was sentenced to flogging
and death. She is a prisoner of conscience, currently in detention with her
20-month-old son. Meriam Yehya Ibrahim, a 27-year- old Christian Sudanese
woman, eight months pregnant with her second child, was convicted of ‘adultery’
and ‘apostasy’ by a court in Khartoum on 11 May. Meriam was given three
days by the court to recant her faith. .
Treating adultery and apostasy as criminal offences is
not consistent with international human rights law – including the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights – to which Sudan is a
state party. The criminalization of adultery violates the rights to freedom of
expression and association and invariably discriminates against women in its
enforcement. The criminalization of apostasy is incompatible with the right to
freedom of thought, conscience and religion. Meriam Ibrahim is a prisoner of
conscience, convicted solely because of her religious beliefs and identity, and
must be released immediately and unconditionally.
Meriam was arrested and charged with adultery in August
2013 after a family member reportedly claimed that she was committing adultery
because of her marriage to a Christian South Sudanese man. Under Shari’a law as
practised in Sudan, a Muslim woman is not permitted to marry a non-Muslim man,
and any such marriage is considered adultery. The court added the charge of
apostasy in February 2014 when Meriam asserted that she was a Christian and not
a Muslim. According to Meriam, she was raised as an Orthodox Christian, her
mother’s religion, because her father, a Muslim, was absent during her
childhood. Meriam risks being sentenced to up to 100 lashes for adultery under
Article 146. If she refuses to recant her Christian faith, she risks the death
penalty for apostasy under Article 126 of the Sudan Criminal Code. The punishment
of flogging violates the absolute prohibition against torture and other
ill-treatment in international human rights law. Amnesty International
considers the death penalty to be the ultimate cruel, inhuman and degrading
punishment and a violation of the right to life and opposes its use in all
cases and without exception, regardless of the nature of the crime.
Please write immediately in Arabic, English or your own
language:
Urging the authorities to ensure that Meriam Yehya
Ibrahim is released immediately and unconditionally because she is a prisoner
of conscience, convicted solely because of her religious beliefs and identity; Calling on the authorities to repeal Articles 126 and 146 that criminalise
apostasy and adultery respectively, in conformity with Sudan’s obligations
under international human rights law; Calling on the authorities to abolish
the punishment of flogging and the death penalty.
PLEASE SEND APPEALS BEFORE 24 JUNE 2014 TO:
Minister of Justice
Mohamed Bushara Dousa
Ministry of Justice
Email: moj@moj.gov.sd
Salutation: Your Excellency
Minister of Foreign Affairs
Ali Ahmed Karti
Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Email: ministry@mfa.gov.sd
Salutation: Your Excellency
And copies to:
Minister of Interior
Ibrahim Mahmoud Hamed
Ministry of Interior
Email: mut@isoc.sd
Also send copies to diplomatic representatives accredited
to your country.
Charge d'Affaires: Robert E. Whitehead
Embassy of Sudan in Washington DC
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
The Sudanese Criminal Code formally includes Shari’a law,
including article 126, which states that “(1) Whoever propagates the renunciation
of Islam or publicly renounces it by explicit words or an act of definitive
indication is said to commit the offence of Riddah (apostasy). (2) Whoever
commits apostasy shall be asked to repent within a period decided by the court
and if he insisted on his apostasy and was not a new convert he shall be
punished with death. (3) Punishment for apostasy lapses if the apostate refrained
from apostasy before the execution”. Article 146 on the Penalty for Adultery,
states that “(1) Whoever commits the offence of adultery shall be punished
with: (a) execution, by lapidation [stoning], where the offender is married;
(b) one hundred lashes, where the offender is not married.
There have been no known cases of people executed for
apostasy in Sudan since the 1991 Criminal Code was enacted, but many have had
their charges dropped or convictions overturned after recanting their faith. Over the years, Amnesty International has
documented many cases of people sentenced to flogging in Sudan.
Alert provided by Amnesty International
