June 29, 2008	Sunday	Jamadi-us-Sani 24, 1429

MANSEHRA, June 28: Hundreds of the residents of the area, including heirs of slain people, on Friday organised a demonstration to protest against the prime minister’s announcement to convert the death sentences of the condemned prisoners to life imprisonment.

“We would never allow the government to convert the death sentences to life imprisonments, as it is not only against the rights of the heirs of the slain people but also repugnant to Islamic injunctions, but the prime minister is doing this to pleases Europe and America,” said speakers on the occasion.

The protesters demonstrating under the banner of Tanzeem Islah-i-Rasoom (TIR) marched on the roads, carrying placards and pictures of their loved ones.

Speakers including Maulana Waqarul Haq Usman, Maulana Mohammad Usmani, president of TIR Mukhtar Ahmad Swati and others, charged that the present PPP coalition government had caused irreparable loss to Islam and society. “How a government or a prime minister could convert the death sentence to life imprisonment without the consent and will of the legal heirs of a victim,” they questioned.

They said that if the prime minister did not withdraw his announcement and apologised to the victims’ families, a countrywide movement against the government would be launched.