The Church in Pakistan last week condemned the attempt by Taliban sympathisers and Muslim militants to extend the use of sharia law in the country. There are fears that the introduction of sharia courts in the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) would destabilise the region. In recent weeks there have also been outbreaks of religious violence against non-Muslims in northern Nigeria where sharia law has been introduced.
The unrest coincides with the controversy over the view expressed by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, that some use of sharia law in Britain was "unavoidable".
In Pakistan, the Catholic Bishops' Conference human rights body, the National Commission for Justice and Peace (NCJP), denounced a proposal from the caretaker government of the NWFP to introduce sharia courts in the regions known as Provincially Administered Tribal Areas. Many local imams are sympathetic to the Taliban, which is fighting Nato and Afghan forces in neighbouring Afghanistan and uses sharia law to enforce its political hegemony. The NWFP government sent its proposal to President Pervez Musharraf at the beginning of this month. The President is entitled to approve it, amend it or forward it to parliament after Monday's parliamentary elections. The executive secretary of the NCJP, Peter Jacob, said the proposal seemed to be aimed at appeasing the militants in the Tribal Areas. He said the attempt to "calm down" the growing militancy by accommodating it would encourage similar demands elsewhere. Javed Ahmed Ghamidi, a prominent Islamic scholar in Pakistan, said the plan for a "parallel judicial system" was like trying to cure a disease with another disease.
Meanwhile, in the latest incident of sharia-linked religious violence in Muslim-majority northern Nigeria, 1,000 people were displaced, several critically wounded and every church reportedly destroyed in Shira Yana in Bauchi state earlier this month.
According to sources quoted by the charity Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW), a young woman in Shira Yana spurned the advances of a Muslim man who appealed to her "in the name of the Messenger". She reportedly responded that she knew no messenger. The next day the young man returned with a mob and set fire to her house claiming she had blasphemed against Muhammad. Police fired on the mob and the rampage ensued. In Kano state earlier this month 200 sharia "police" or hisbah patrolled the streets of the Christian area of Kano City, Sabon Gari, armed with sticks and machetes, reportedly detaining 70 women and accusing them of prostitution.