Africa’s “Raif Badawi”: Imprisoned blogger has been waiting in death cell for three years due to charges of apostasy

The Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) has sent an appeal to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, asking him to work towards the release of a man who, in Mauritania, was sentenced to death based on charges of apostasy. “The suffering of Mohamed Cheikh Ould M’Kheitir is similar to that of the blogger Raif Badawi in Saudi Arabia. However, while many politicians all over the world have advocated for Badawi, only few people have heard M’Kheitir – although his case is all the more absurd. He is threatened with execution, not just lashes and long imprisonment,” explained Ulrich Delius, the STP’s Africa expert, in Göttingen on Thursday. The 34-year-old is accused of apostasy from Islam because he had written a blog-post criticizing discrimination and social injustice in his home country. The Supreme Court of Mauritania will once again discuss the death sentence against the blogger (which was confirmed in an appeals procedure in December 2014) on January 21, 2017.

The blogger has now been in custody for three years. He had been arrested on January 2, 2014, after he had posted a Facebook-blogpost under the title “Religion, Religiosity and the Blacksmiths”, criticizing the strict caste system in Mauritanian society – and, in particular, the exclusion of the blacksmiths. The blogger had emphasized that the discriminatory system was not God-given, but installed by mankind. Religion should not be misused to discriminate. In the court proceedings, M’Kheitir had emphasized that he never wanted to defame the Prophet Mohamed, but only to draw attention to injustices. M’Kheitir belongs to the caste of the blacksmiths, who are often discriminated against. He himself, however, did not suffer from discrimination, because his father was appointed Prefect despite his caste.

Following his son’s conviction, the Prefect had lost his position and was forced to retreat from public life due to many threats by radical Islamists. In December 2016, M’Kheitir’s parents had escaped to France to apply for political asylum. In recent months, Islamic movements and imams in Mauritania managed to mobilize thousands of protesters to demand the immediate execution of the Blogger. The renowned poet Douh Ould Beyrouck had even announced that he would assassinate the young man if the court were to have him released. If the death sentence is to be carried out, this will be the first execution based on charges of apostasy in the country. The last time the death penalty was carried out in Mauritania was in 1987.

Header Photo: UN Photo/Jean-Marc Ferré