Pakistani Christian girl accused of blasphemy denied meeting with lawyer

ICC Note:
A Christian girl, who reportedly has Down syndrome, was arrested Friday for allegedly carrying burned pages of the Quran. The accusations led to hundreds of Muslim demonstrators chanting on the street for the child’s death. The situation now appears to be taking a turn for the worst when a lawyer that sought to defend the girl was refused a meeting with her on Thursday, Agence France-Presse reports.
8/23/2012 Pakistan (AFP) – A lawyer for a young Pakistani Christian girl arrested on blasphemy charges in a poor suburb of Islamabad claimed Thursday he had been refused a meeting with her.
Police arrested the girl, Rimsha, who reportedly has Down’s Syndrome, in a low-income neighbourhood of the capital last Thursday after she was accused of burning papers containing verses from the Koran, and remanded her for 14 days.
Rimsha, aged between 11 and 16, is being held in a jail in Islamabad’s twin city Rawalpindi, and her case has prompted concern from Western governments and fury from rights campaigners.
“The lawyers are facing difficulties to see the accused girl. The jail authorities have told them to get permission from the top authorities,” Shamaun Alfred Gill, a spokesman for All Pakistan Minorities Alliance (APMA), told AFP.
Her legal team said they had approached the higher authorities in Punjab province but could not get a go ahead for the meeting.
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