Demonstrators call for Aafia Siddiqui’s release
Demonstrations have been held in Karachi to demand the release of Pakistani neuroscientist Aafia Siddiqui, who is imprisoned in the United States, Press TV reports.
Friday’s main demonstration was organized by the country’s largest political-religious party Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), a Press TV correspondent said.
JI Karachi chief Muhammad Hussain Mahenti said that the Unites States’ judiciary had proved that it was fully biased against Muslims and Islam, when it sentenced Siddiqui for 86 years in prison without due process of law.The protesters were holding placards and banners bearing anti-US slogans. They also denounced the Pakistani government for taking a hands-off approach in dealing with the Siddiqui issue.
In September 2010, a court in New York sentenced Siddiqui to 86 years in prison after she was found guilty of ‘opening fire’ on FBI agents and US military personnel in a police station in Ghazni, Afghanistan, where she was being interrogated in 2008.
The mother of three vanished in Karachi with her three children on March 30, 2003. The following day, local newspapers reported that she had been abducted by US forces and charged with terrorism.
Human rights groups say that Siddiqui had secretly been transferred to the US base in Bagram, north of Kabul, and tortured for five years prior to the alleged incident in 2008.
She was taken to the US in July 2008 and was convicted in a New York court in February 2010.
In Karachi on Friday, the sister of Aafia Siddiqui, Dr. Fowzia Siddiqui, led another protest rally from Tibet center to Karachi Press club.
Fowzia told Press TV that there are serious concerns regarding Siddiqui’s health, and that US officials have repeatedly turned down her request to meet her sister.
She described the conditions in Carswell prison as inhuman. Siddiqui is currently detained at the Federal Medical Center Carswell in Fort Worth, Texas, which provides specialized medical and mental health services to female prisoners.
Fowzia also appealed to American people to raise their voice against the ‘inhuman’ act.
