ICC Note:
Meriam Yahia Ibrahim continues to await the submission of her letter of appeal following her sentencing to 100 lashes and death May 15. Arrested and detained on February 17, charged on March 4, convicted on May 11, and sentenced Thursday, Meriam (eight months pregnant with her second child) and her 20-month-old son Martin have suffered detention in a Sudanese prison for months. And, with the appeal expected to take as many as two years, their suffering could be just beginning.
05/20/2014 Sudan (World Magazine) – Sudanese Judge Abaas Al Khalifa sentenced a 27-year-old pregnant mother to death by hanging after she refused to recant her Christian faith earlier this month. She also will face 100 lashes for “adultery” because the court does not recognize her marriage to a Christian South Sudanese man.
Even after officials tried to get Meriam Yahia Ibrahim to renounce Christianity, she told Al Khalifa on May 15, “I am a Christian and I have never been a Muslim.” She is the first person the Sudanese court has sentenced to death, although Christians have faced whippings, beatings, and arbitrary detention under the country’s Sharia law, according to International Christian Concern (ICC).
According to her husband, Daniel Wani, a naturalized U.S. citizen, her attorneys plan to appeal the ruling. Ibrahim, who has a 20-month-old son in prison with her, is eight months pregnant and could go into labor with her second child any day now, according to Morning Star News (MSN). If the sentencing stands, she will face her flogging sometime after giving birth, then will have two years to raise the newborn before authorities execute her, according to the Institute on Religion and Democracy.
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