PAKISTAN: CHRISTIAN SENTENCED TO DEATH FOR 'BLASPHEMOUS TEXTS'

September 10, 2020:

A court in the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore on 8 September 2020 sentenced a Christian man to death for having committed "blasphemy", his lawyer said.
Asif Pervaiz, 37, has been in custody since 2013 when he was accused of having sent "blasphemous" text messages to a former supervisor at work, lawyer Saif-ul-Malook told Al Jazeera.
The court rejected his testimony wherein he denied the charges and sentenced him to death.
"The complainant was a supervisor in a hosiery factory where Asif was working under him," said Malook.
"He denied the allegations and said that this man was trying to get him to convert to Islam."
Speaking in his own defence in court earlier in the trial, Pervaiz claimed the supervisor confronted him after he quit work at the factory, and when he refused to convert he was accused of having sent blasphemous text messages to the man.
Muhammad Saeed Khokher, the complainant in the case, denies wanting to convert Parvaiz, according to his lawyer, Ghulam Mustafa Chaudhry.