Not all countries are as tolerant as Bahrain. It stands out like a beacon as signs increase that religious intolerance is on the rise.

In 1948 the nations of the world met in Paris and passed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Article 18 included the statement: “Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion, this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief.”

This right was to help to prevent the persecution of those who practise minority religions. It is a principle that helps to guarantee, to take one example, the right of Christian to convert to Islam, if they so choose.

In recent years many thousands have indeed so chosen and have been left to enjoy their choice in peace.

In a prison in Khartoum, the capital of Sudan, a woman – in shackles for five months – gave birth to a baby girl. If the Sudanese courts have their way the child will be nursed by her mother for two years. Then that mother, Meriam Yehya Ibrahim, 27 will receive 100 lashes for adultery and then be hanged for apostasy.

The courts have judged that she was born a Muslim (because her absent father was one) and therefore that her claim to be a Christian, following marriage to a Christian man, meets the criteria under Sudan’s version of Sharia for the death penalty.

The hanging will not, however, be carried out if she renounces her faith and embraces Islam.

This she refuses to do. The sentence of 100 lashes for adultery remains to be carried out some time before her execution.

Pinch yourself. This is 2014 not 1014.

Meriam’s imprisonment is an offence against basic human rights. Under any civilised code her crime would be no crime at all, but her murder by the Sudanese state most certainly would be a terrible one.

A campaign by Amnesty International for Meriam’s release has already received the support of 147,000 people and we hope that many more will sign up.

It is clear that in many countries of the world, archaic religious laws or cultural practices are increasingly becoming a major threat to women and religious minorities.

Cruel and archaic form of jurisprudence is not a requirement of modern Islam. It is not practised in Turkey, Bosnia or in many other countries where Muslims are a majority.

But in those countries where such laws are in force, the human consequences are appalling. It is time for governments that endorse the Universal Declaration of Human Rights to make its implementation a goal of foreign policy and a condition both of aid and support.
Herbert Grimes