Home Latest News Chinese Engineer Arrested for Alleged Blasphemy

Chinese Engineer Arrested for Alleged Blasphemy

Employed at the Dasu Dam project, the suspect is accused of insulting Islam while local staff were offering prayers at the worksite on Saturday

by Staff Report

A photo of blasphemy-accused Tian in police custody

Police in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa on Sunday confirmed the arrest of a Chinese engineer over alleged blasphemy after thousands of locals protested and called for legal action against him.

According to the First Information Report (FIR) registered against the accused, identified as Mr. Tian, he has been accused of making insulting remarks and derogatory gestures against Islam and its Prophet. He has been charged under Section 295C of the Pakistan Penal Code, as well as Sections 6 and 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997. The accused is the head of heavy transport at the China Gezhouba Group Company, which is constructing the Dasu hydropower project.

Police said the Chinese supervisor had, on Saturday, been pushing his local staff to expedite their pace of work when they were collectively offering afternoon prayers at the worksite during Ramzan. During their conversation, he allegedly insulted Islam, enraging his staff, who took out angry protests across Kohistan district—where the Dasu Dam is under construction—on Sunday evening, blocking the main highway linking Pakistan with China.

The demonstrations reportedly continued for several hours only subsided early on Monday after the Chinese national was taken into custody and local elders assured he would face legal action, police said, adding that all traffic blockades had been cleared and routine service restored on the Karakoram Highway.

Blasphemy remains a controversial issue in Pakistan, with convictions carrying a death penalty. A surge in blasphemy cases in recent years has provoked discussions over the need to repeal the country’s blasphemy laws, but clerics have opposed this, arguing that the law enables police to prevent lynchings that would otherwise be “commonplace.”

Despite the presence of the laws, however, suspects accused of blasphemy are often attacked and sometimes lynched by mobs. Critics maintain that several blasphemy cases are fraudulent and used to settle personal scores and intimidate religious minorities.

In December 2021, a Sri Lankan factory manager was beaten to death by his co-workers in Sialkot after being falsely accused of insulting Islam. Six of the men involved in that crime have been sentenced to death.

The Dasu Dam project where this weekend’s protests occurred employs several Chinese nationals who live at work in guarded facilities of the area. Work on the project had been suspended for several months after July 2021 when a suicide bombing targeted a bus convoy transporting Chinese and Pakistani workers to the construction site, killing nine Chinese men and three locals. Following the attack, the Chinese government had called on Pakistan to ensure security for its staff.

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