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Tag: apostasy
Sudanese Christian Woman Spared Execution Arrives In United States

Sudanese Christian Woman Spared Execution Arrives In United States

Washington (AFP) — A Sudanese Christian woman — sentenced to death for renouncing Islam but acquitted after international pressure on Khartoum — has arrived in the United States with her family.

Meriam Ibrahim Tehya Ishag flew first into the east coast city of Philadelphia Thursday, where she was welcomed by the mayor as a “world freedom fighter,” media reports said.

The mayor presented her with a model of the Liberty Bell, a symbol of U.S. independence, the reports said.

The 26-year-old, her two infant children, and her U.S. citizen husband Daniel Wani later continued on to New Hampshire, where Wani has family, and was greeted by cheering supporters with balloons and U.S. flags, the reports added.

After leaving Sudan, the family had spent eight days in Rome, where Ishag met Pope Francis, visited the Colosseum, shopped, and “learned how to live again,” she said.

The White House last week said it was delighted at Ishag’s release and looked forward to welcoming her to the United States.

A global outcry erupted in May after Ishag was sentenced under sharia law to hang for apostasy.

Days after her conviction, she gave birth to her daughter in prison.

Ishag’s conviction was overturned in June, but she was immediately rearrested while trying to leave Sudan using what prosecutors claimed were forged documents.

Two days later, Ishag was released from prison and she and her family took refuge in the U.S. embassy because of mounting death threats.

Ishag was born to a Muslim father who abandoned the family, and was raised by her Ethiopian Orthodox Christian mother. The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Khartoum says Ishaq joined the Catholic church shortly before she married in 2011.

She was convicted under Islamic sharia law that has been in force in Sudan since 1983, and that says Muslim conversion to another faith is punishable by death.

The court had also sentenced her to 100 lashings because under sharia law it considered her union with her non-Muslim husband to be adultery.

Ishag’s case raised questions of religious freedom in mostly-Muslim Sudan and sparked vocal protests from Western governments and human rights groups.

The case has re-focused attention on a country which has slipped from the international spotlight but where war continues with millions of people in need of humanitarian aid.

AFP Photo

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Sudanese Christian Woman Who Faced Death Over Her Faith Meets Pope Francis

Sudanese Christian Woman Who Faced Death Over Her Faith Meets Pope Francis

By Robyn Dixon, Los Angeles Times

JOHANNESBURG — A Sudanese Christian woman who faced a death sentence for refusing to renounce her Christian faith flew to Italy on Thursday and met with Pope Francis.

Meriam Ibrahim was sentenced to death by a court in Khartoum, Sudan, in May for illegally abandoning the Muslim faith. She was given a chance to renounce Christianity to save herself, but refused. The case prompted calls from around the world for Sudan to respect freedom of religion.

A court overturned the penalty in June, but when Ibrahim and her family tried to leave the country the same day to go to the United States, they were detained by Sudanese security agents and accused of falsifying her travel documents.

Italy’s deputy foreign minister, Lapo Pistelli, who traveled from Khartoum with Ibrahim and her family, broke the news she had been able to leave the country on his Facebook page Thursday, just before the plane carrying them landed in Rome.

“A couple of minutes away from Rome. Mission accomplished,” wrote a smiling Pistelli, beside a photograph of himself with Ibrahim’s toddler son, Martin, leaning on his knee, drinking from a bottle.

The photo also shows Ibrahim holding her baby, Maya, who was born when she was in prison, on death row.

Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi met Ibrahim at the airport, calling it a day of celebration. A statement from the Vatican said that Ibrahim and her family would live in the United States. The family was expected to spend a few days in Italy before flying to the United States, Pistelli told reporters.

There was no prior announcement that Ibrahim would be leaving the country and the move took even her lawyer, Mohaned Mostafa, by surprise, Reuters reported. Mostafa told the news agency that the Sudanese prohibition on her leaving the country had not been lifted.

Ibrahim’s son Martin was also with her in the harsh Omdurman women’s prison. The Sudanese court sentence said that she would be allowed to nurse her daughter for two years, then would be executed.

Ibrahim married an American-Sudanese Christian, Daniel Wani, in 2011, enraging members of her father’s family, Sudanese Muslims. A family member reported her to the authorities, leading to the charge of apostasy.

She was also sentenced to 100 lashes for adultery, because her marriage to Wani was not recognized as legal.

Under Sudanese law it is a crime to renounce Islam, and Muslim women are barred from marriage to non-Muslims.

But Ibrahim insisted she was never a Muslim and was raised by her mother, an Ethiopian Christian, as a Christian.

The head of the Vatican press office, Father Federico Lombardi, described the pope’s visit with Ibrahim as “very serene and affectionate.”

The Vatican published a photograph of Francis touching a bareheaded Ibrahim on the head. Ibrahim was clad in black, holding baby Maya, dressed in white.

Lombardi said in a statement that the pope wished to show his support for freedom of religion in all countries.

“With this gesture the pope wished also to show his closeness, attention and prayer for all those who suffer because of their faith and in particular Christians who suffer persecution or restriction to their freedom of religion.”

“The pope thanked Meriam and her family for their courageous witness of perseverance in the faith,” the statement said. “Meriam gave thanks for the great support and comfort which she received from the prayers of the pope and of many other people who believe and are of good will.”

AFP Photo/Osservatore Romano

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U.S: Sudan Has Not Re-Arrested Freed Christian Woman

U.S: Sudan Has Not Re-Arrested Freed Christian Woman

Washington (AFP) — The United States said Tuesday that it had received assurances a Sudanese Christian woman has not, as reported, been re-arrested, one day after a court annulled her death sentence for apostasy.

State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said Washington has been informed by Sudan that “the family was temporarily detained at the airport for several hours by the government for questioning about issues related to their travel and, I think, travel documents.

“They have not been arrested,” she added. “The government has assured us of their safety. The embassy has and will remain highly involved in working with the family and the government. We are engaging directly with Sudanese officials to secure their safe and swift departure from Sudan.”

Earlier, a Sudanese source had told AFP that Meriam Yahia Ibrahim Ishag, 26, and her American husband Daniel Wani had been arrested at Khartoum airport while trying to leave Sudan.

Ishag’s case sparked an outcry from Western governments and rights groups after a lower-court judge sentenced her to death for apostasy — or abandoning her faith — on May 15.

Born to a Muslim father and an Ethiopian Orthodox Christian mother, Ishag was convicted under Islamic sharia law. This code has been in force in Sudan since 1983 and outlaws conversions on pain of death.

When Ishag was five, her Muslim father abandoned the family, and she was raised according to her mother’s Christian faith.

The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Khartoum has said she joined the Catholic church shortly before she married and denied she had ever been Muslim.

AFP Photo/File

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Sudan Frees Christian Woman Sentenced To Death For Apostasy

Sudan Frees Christian Woman Sentenced To Death For Apostasy

By Robyn Dixon, Los Angeles Times

JOHANNESBURG — A Christian woman in Sudan sentenced to death last month for apostasy was released Monday after her conviction was overturned by Khartoum’s appeal court, according to her lawyer.

The appeal court Monday ordered Meriam Yehya Ibrahim’s release after hearing her appeal, according to Sudan’s official news agency, SUNA. Her lawyer, Mohamed Mustafa Elnour, said she had been released, Reuters news service reported.

Ibrahim, 27, recently gave birth to her second child in Omdurman’s women’s prison from her marriage to Daniel Wani, an American Christian from South Sudan. She was jailed in February with her first child, Martin, after a family member reported her to the authorities over her marriage to a non-Muslim.

A court convicted Ibrahim last month and sentenced her to death by hanging for apostasy, even though she insisted she had been raised a Christian by her Ethiopian Christian mother and had never been a Muslim. The court also ruled her 2011 marriage to Wani invalid and sentenced her to 100 lashes for adultery.

The conviction and sentences were condemned by human rights groups such as Amnesty International and Western governments including the United States and Britain, with calls for Sudan to guarantee freedom of religion.

In Sudan, abandoning Islam to convert to Christianity or another faith is an offense punishable by death under the country’s 1991 penal code. The court gave Ibrahim a chance to renounce her Christianity in order to avoid the death sentence, but she refused to do so.

According to Ibrahim, her father was a Muslim but played no role in her upbringing after leaving the family when she was 6. But in Sudan, children are supposed to be brought up in their father’s faith. In her initial court hearing, Ibrahim’s lawyers presented witnesses who testified that she was a regular churchgoer.

Conditions in the women’s prison were harsh, with reports that Ibrahim was in chains in her cell. She gave birth to her second child in the jail’s hospital wing.

Elnour, her attorney, told Reuters that she had been sent to a safe location after her release in fear for her safety.

“Her family had been threatened before, and we are worried that someone might try to harm her,” he said.

Ibrahim’s second child, a daughter, was born shortly after the death penalty was handed down. The court ruled that she would be allowed to care for the baby for two years, then the death penalty would be carried out.

AFP Photo / Ashraf Shazly

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