The Sunni extremists in Pakistan stopped the organisers of the Aurat March for women’s right in Islamabad from completing a mural, claiming it was against Sharia. The Islamists also defaced the mural and wrote hateful messages addressed to the Shia community.
Nearby graffiti credits the defacing to the Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan, a Sunni extremist group banned under Pakistani law. One slogan – since painted over – declares all Shia Muslims to be “kaafir” (infidels). pic.twitter.com/CBGPQa8BlC
— Asad Hashim (@AsadHashim) March 4, 2020
Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan, a Sunni extremist group banned under Pakistani law, took the responsibility of vandalising the mural. The extremists painted hostile slogans against Shia Muslims, who are a minority in a Sunni dominated Pakistan. The slogan written on the mural declared Shia Muslims to be “Kaafir” (infidels).
According to one of the organisers of the Aurat March, Tooba Syed, Sunni extremists vandalised the mural of two women painted on the wall by spraying black paint over it while the police silently watched over their vandalism. She took to Twitter to mention that the rabid clerics threatened them saying that the painting was a fahashi (obscene).
The first two are the photos of the mural which has been sprayed black by the goons of Lal Masjid in Islamabad. The city administration didn’t do anything. The police stood there watching and asking us to stop. This was painted by permission of the family. How is this okay?! pic.twitter.com/jxhcsrC0E6
— Tooba Syed AWP ☭ (@Tooba_Sd) March 3, 2020
Syed accused that the clerics who defaced the mural were goons from Lal Masjid. She also added how the administration stood there as a mute spectator instead of taking action against the clerics for vandalising the mural which was painted after taking the permission of the family.
Minorities, including Muslim sects of Shia and Ahmadiyya, live under a constant threat in Pakistan for not espousing the same set of beliefs as held by the majority of Pakistan. Radical outfit Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan (SSP) is a Sunni sectarian outfit that has been alleged to be involved in terrorist violence, primarily targeted against the minority Shia community in Pakistan. The Pakistan government had banned the organisation twice, first in 2002 and then again in 2012. It has been accused of committing atrocities against Shias in Pakistan.
