Print it and they will kill you

The pen may not always be mightier than the sword.

—By

| Fri Feb. 2, 2001 1:00 AM PST

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According to the GUARDIAN (UK), seven journalists from an English-language newspaper in Pakistan may be executed for printing a "highly sacrilegious" letter to the editor. The letter in question accused the prophet Mohammed of anti-semitism and male-chauvinism, and of making revelations from God "in order to satisfy his political or personal agenda or his libido."

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Islamic protesters set fire to the Frontier Post's printing presses and ransacked the paper's offices after the letter's publication. Police then stormed the building and arrested staff members, holding them under a Pakistani law that carries the death penalty for blasphemy.

The Post published a letter of apology in rival newspapers, but maintained that it was the victim of a right-wing conspiracy bent on closing down the publication. The owner of the paper was arrested for drug trafficking in 1999, and has been in jail ever since.

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