In Pakistan, blasphemy-related arrests of Muslims and non-Muslims are common, but foreigners are rarely imprisoned.
Digital Desk: Chinese national was detained by Pakistani police on suspicion of blasphemy after allegedly insulting Islam and the Prophet Muhammad, according to reports on Monday. The offense entails a death sentence under Pakistan's contentious blasphemy laws.
The man, named only as Mr Tian from China, was apprehended on Sunday night after hundreds of locals and construction workers for a dam stopped a major highway and held a rally calling for his arrest, police said.
According to Komela's police chief, Naseer Khan, the gathering took place in the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, which borders Afghanistan.
Khan reported that authorities rescued and detained the Chinese national shortly after they were alerted to the protests.
Khan said, "We're still looking into it."
Later, the blocked roadway was freed to traffic once again, and work at the Dasu Dam, where hundreds of Pakistanis and thousands of Chinese are employed, Khan said.
In Pakistan, a devoutly Muslim nation, mob attacks against those suspected of blasphemy and even lynching attacks are common. Rights organisations assert that accusations of blasphemy are frequently used to intimidate religious minorities and settle personal scores.
Videos that were circulating on social media showed an irate mob protesting outside a large compound in Komela that housed Chinese and Pakistani construction workers. The crowds are being dispersed by security personnel firing rounds into the air while the protesters can be heard chanting, "God is great."
In Pakistan, blasphemy-related arrests of Muslims and non-Muslims are common, but foreigners are rarely imprisoned.
However, a mob in 2021 publicly torched a Sri Lankan man's body after lynching him at a sports industry in the eastern Punjab region because he allegedly destroyed Muhammad-related posters.
If investigations reveal the Chinese national offended Islam, the blasphemy laws will be used to prosecute him, according to the police. The jailed Chinese guy, according to Khan, the police head, was in charge of heavy transport at the time the other workers said he had insulted the prophet at the Dasu Dam project.
The arrest occurs a few days after Punjab police detained a Muslim woman on blasphemy charges after she allegedly claimed to be an Islamic prophet. She was brought into jail from her home when a mob amassed outside and demanded that she be lynched after word of her purported claims of prophethood circulated.
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