Abduction: A weapon for conversion forcibly

There are different ways of persecuting Christians in today's world. Different cultural backgrounds have different forms of harassment and torture in Christian communities, especially when Christians are a minority. Pakistan is one of the countries with the highest ranking in this regard.

Kidnapping of religious minority girls, especially underage Christian girls, and forcing them to convert to Islam by marrying their kidnapper is a long-standing phenomenon in Pakistani society.

According to Morning Star News, in early January, a 14-year-old girl named Mahnoor Ashraf was abducted by one of their Muslim neighbors, Mohammad Ali Khan Ghaouri. Despite the fact that they reported the kidnapping to the police from the very beginning and went to Mohammad Ali's house with the police, there is no news about Mohammad Ali since the day Mahnour disappeared.
Ghauri was also charged with illegally marrying a minor. But police have been slow to respond.

These cases are on the rise in Pakistan where Christian  girls are kidnapped, forced to convert to Islam, and then forced to marry their kidnappers, even though the country has the Sindh Child Marriage Restraint Act which forbids marriage below the age of 18.

The girls generally are kidnapped by complicit acquaintances and men looking for brides. Sometimes they are taken by powerful landlords. Once converted, the girls are quickly married off, often to older men or to their abductors, according to the independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan.

According to statistics compiled by human rights groups in 2021, each year, 1,000 Pakistani girls forcibly converted to Islam.

Mahnoor's story is one of the thousands of painful tragedies that befall girls under the age of Christianity and religious minorities on a daily basis.

 Many of these cases are left without result in police offices, and their families are forced to accept the status with threats and intimidation in their ongoing efforts to retrieve their daughters, and then being forced to remain silent.

 

Source and Credit: MSN, CBN News, ABC News