Anti-blasphemy laws, extreme penalties, and infringements on freedom of expression.
6 articlesYahaya Sharif-Aminu was sentenced to hang over a song he shared on WhatsApp. Six and a half years on, Nigeria's Supreme Court still has not managed to fit his appeal into its schedule.
Prosecutors in Pakistan have been told to show that the digital evidence used to convict Junaid Hafeez is both admissible and authentic. The former lecturer has been on death row for blasphemy since 2019, and his appeal has been waiting since 2020.
Sivarasa Anojan, a Tamil migrant worker from Sri Lanka, now faces the death penalty after a Saudi appeals court replaced his five-year prison term for blasphemy tied to a Facebook comment. A Sri Lankan MP is challenging the government's handling of the appeal.
Two Christians in Pakistan now face charges under the country's blasphemy laws, among them Section 295-C, which is punishable by death. One man is accused of insulting Muhammad in speech, the other of sharing a video online.
Samuel Arif, a 26-year-old Christian, is on judicial remand in Lahore on blasphemy charges after residents beat him and police took him into custody. His family says a personal feud, not any insult to religion, lies behind the accusation.
In March 2024, supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada pledged to flog and stone women in public. Rights groups now count 2,745 people subjected to corporal punishment between February 2022 and April 2026, and the U.N. says 2025 broke every previous record.
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