Two Christian men have been sentenced to life imprisonment in Pakistan under the country's blasphemy laws, over charges their lawyers claim were trumped up.
On Friday, Qamar David, a Christian from Lahore who has been in prison since 2006, received the verdict of the Court which sentenced him to life imprisonment for blasphemy against Islam.
"The conviction was based only on statements and testimonies that were made up as a result of hatred and prejudice," notes Parvez Choudry, lawyer of Qamar David.
The second man, Imran Masih, 26, was sentenced to life in prison for blasphemy on January 11.
A neighbor accused him of burning a copy of the Koran, but Fides news service reports that Masih was burning Arabic books while cleaning his shop and had asked a neighbor to examine whether the books were on religion or Islamic prayer, since he did not himself read Arabic.
The neighbour had assured him that they were not but later made a complaint that Masih desecrated and burnt a Koran.
"The Christian community is very sad. This law does not help dialogue and harmony in society in any way. The Church calls for its cancellation," Archbishop Rufin Anthony, the new Archbishop of Islamabad-Rawalpindi, told Agenzia Fides.
"The accusations are unjust, manipulated and unproven," the news report cites from an unamed source within the Catholic Church in Pakistan.
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Life imprisonment for two Christians accused of blasphemy, amidst deceit and falsehood (Agenzia Fides)