Koran lesson abuse kills boy

Sunday Telegraph:

The parents of a blind seven-year-old who was sent to a religious school in Pakistan have told how he was hung by his feet from a ceiling and beaten to death after failing to memorize the Koran.

The parents of Mohammed Atif admitted that they had ignored their son Mohammed's repeated complaints about abuse at the madrassah.

Police in the Punjab province said that Mohammed's religious teacher, Qari Ziauddin, was now in custody charged with torturing and murdering the boy on Thursday.

Police said Ziauddin, whose title "Qari" signifies he is a mullah, had suspended the boy from a ceiling fan for an hour before he beat him. When he realised how badly Mohammed was hurt, he apparently fled instead of taking him to hospital.

The boy's body was not discovered until the next day when fellow pupils, including Mohammed's cousin, realised he had not slept in his bed. They searched the madrassah and found his battered corpse in Ziauddin's room.

An autopsy concluded that Mohammed, who was blind from birth, died of severe head injuries and also found marks of "physical torture" on his body. Police said the fatal blow might have been caused by Ziauddin dropping the boy when he cut him down from the fan.

According to the boy's father, the teacher had previously smashed him over the head with an iron rod, cutting him so badly that he needed stitches.

"We got the boy treated and wanted to pull him out of the madrassah but we decided to readmit him after the teacher said he would show some mercy to the boy," Mohammed's father Fayyaz Ahmed, 35, said. "We really did not expect him to go so far after he reassured us."

Mohammed was sent to the school eight months ago in the hope that he would become a Hafiz-e-Quran - a scholar who wins great respect by memorising the whole of the Koran.

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This teacher should be charged at a minimum with man slaughter. One of the sicknesses associated with radical Islam is the belief that corporal punishment can always change someones conduct. that is actually the motivation for al Qaeda's attacks on non combatants to persuade people to do as they say. Many Muslims have engaged in violent demonstrations because they thought the Koran had been abused. Will they be silent when a boy is abused and killed over his Koran lessons? Probably so.