ISLAMABAD, June 28: The additional district and sessions judge, Chaudary Mohammad Younas, on Friday acquitted a Somalian national of the charges of desecration of the Holy Quran.

Fateh Abdul Rehman, who had came to Pakistan for higher studies in 1992, was arrested by the Golra police last year after his neighbours alleged that he had set some pages of the Holy Quran on fire.

The police booked him under section 295(B) of the PPC, which provided life imprisonment for the offence. The accused claimed that he had great respect for the holy book and was, in fact, burning his old textbooks outside his apartment in Sector F-10.

He also claimed that he mistook some of the pages of the Holy Quran for some Russian literature and set them on fire.

Some of the prosecution witnesses, who lived in the same area, had earlier stated before the police that they had seen the incident.

However, while recording their statement before the court they contended that they had heard about the incident.

The court, in its order, noted that the prosecution failed to establish the charge and ordered acquittal of the accused.