Christian life in Pakistan

Christians abducted for their organs and the police taking a laisez-faire approach.

Mar Balochan (AsiaNews) – Trafficking in human organs might be behind the recent spate of disappearances reported in and around Sangla Hill, a village in Punjab’s Nankanna district. The most sensational case is that of Francis Nadeem, a 15-year-old Christian who was abducted and killed according to his self-confessed captors. But so far his body has not been found and the police seem more interested in protecting the two culprits who are from influential local families. The story is reported in Pakistan Christian Post, a local Protestant paper that gathered the elements of the story from the family of the missing boy and from ROD (Rays of Development), an NGO that sent a fact finding team to the area.

Sadeeq Masih, Francis Nadeem’s father, said that in the evening of “20 December, Muhammad Imran and Muhammad Zaman, two rich and powerful Muslims from a neighbouring village came to our house and took away Francis by force. They left on a motorbike and never came back. As soon as we could, we started looking for him everywhere, but without results.”

Members of the family of Christian boy even went to see the families of the two Muslims, but were chased away without any explanation.

When this did not work, Sadeeq turned to the police. “We filed a missing person report and the police began an enquiry into my son’s disappearance.” However, Imran and Zaman were stopped only on 14 January when they admitted to abducting and killing the boy, telling police even where they had dumped the body.

So far the police have shown no inclination to do much about the matter. Instead the ROD team visited the area where the murderers said they had disposed of the body but found nothing.

For Sadeeq local policemen “are corrupt.” In his view “they are covering up for the kidnappers because they are rich and influential. We are denied the truth.”

The boy’s father goes even further: “I am convinced that Francis was not killed. I think that like others who have disappeared in the area he is being used for his organs. I am sure there is an actual gang involved in this horrible traffic.”

As a matter of fact ROD has released a statement saying that there have been “at least 12 unexplained disappearances in the area over the past two months”.