‘You Cannot Fight the State’: Asia Bibi Protesters Warned as Unrest Continues to Grow, Release Date Delayed

Image source: Twitter via Gul Bukhari
Image source: Twitter via Gul Bukhari
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The release of Asia Bibi from prison has been delayed due to increasingly dangerous protests that threaten the safety of the newly acquitted Christian mother.

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Police are struggling to contain over 2,000 Islamists who have blocked a key highway linking the capital, Islamabad, with the garrison city of Rawalpindi. The protesters are predominantly associated with the radical political party Tehreek-e-Labaik (TLP). Demonstrators have also taken to the streets in Karachi, Lahore, Peshawar and Multan, with several violent clashes reported by police officials.

Following the Supreme Court’s acquittal of Bibi, who had been held for almost 10 years on bogus blasphemy charges, Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan called for calm and denounced those who continue to threaten both Bibi and the Supreme Court justices with reprisals.

“Which government can function like this, blackmailed by protests?” Khan declared in his bold address, as reported by the BBC. “And who suffers due to this? Our Pakistanis. The common people, the poor. You block the roads, you rob people’s livelihood… .”

“This is not the service of Islam,” he added, “this is enmity with the country. Only anti-state elements talk like this, that kill the judges, start a revolt in army… . They are only trying to beef up their vote bank.”

However, it appears that senior clerics did not take well to such remarks. On Friday, schools and colleges were closed after Khadim Hussain Rizvi, the leader of Tehreek-e-Labbaik, announced that talks between his party and the government had failed.

“We are ready to die to show our love for the prophet,” he told energetic crowds gathered in Lahore, according to Sky News.

Rivzi reportedly wants Bibi prohibited from leaving the country, but the government has again pushed back against the radicals, with information minister Fawad Chaudhry declaring that the state will not be dictated to by firebrand clerics who wish to see Bibi dead.

“The government is a guarantor of the people’s lives and freedom,” Chaudhry said Friday, as reported by Geo.tv.

While the minister admitted that the government is reluctant to use force against the protesters, he assured the people that this must not be “mistaken for weakness.”

“The law and order situation in the country is under control,” he said. “The state’s patience must not be mistaken for weakness. Upholding the Constitution and the rule of law completely is in the best public interest and we [the government] will fulfill this duty.”

But Chaudhry’s words toward the protesters and their instigators remained very firm.

“Nobody should be under the impression that the state is weak,” he said. “You cannot fight the state. You will not even know what has happened to you.”

There were, however, moments of hope amid the lawlessness, protests and riots. One Pakistani journalist posted a video to Twitter which appeared to show a group of young children moving rocks out of the road in order to let cars pass through freely:

Let’s pray for more of this, as well the safe release of Asia Bibi.