Sudan says woman’s death sentence ‘hinges on appeal’
Meriam Yehya Ibrahim, 27, will only be freed if the court overturns its apostasy verdict, Sudan’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement published by Suna, the state-run news agency. It said an undersecretary at the ministry cited by media as saying Ibrahim would be freed within days was quoted out of context.
Ibrahim, who gave birth to a daughter in prison last week, was sentenced to death by hanging on May 15 after refusing to recant her Christian faith in favour of Islam.
Her legal team lodged an appeal with the Sudanese court on May 22, saying the verdict contradicts Sudan’s 2005 constitution as well as international rights accords to which the country is signatory.
Ibrahim’s mother was an Ethiopian Christian and her father a Sudanese Muslim who left them when she was six, her husband Daniel Wani said in May. She was raised a Christian in Sudan and married Wani in 2011, he said. Wani, a US citizen, has mostly lived in that country since leaving Sudan.
Ibrahim and Wani’s two children may qualify for US citizenship, subject to regulations including DNA testing, US State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said.
Ibrahim was arrested in August after men who said they were from her father’s side of the family reportedly accused her of adultery, Amnesty said in a May 13 statement. Under Sudan’s interpretation of Islamic law, marriage between a Muslim woman and a non-Muslim man isn’t permitted, with any such union considered adultery, the rights group said.
An apostasy charge was added in February when Ibrahim said she was Christian, not Muslim. In addition to the death sentence, the court annulled the marriage and ordered she be lashed 100 times for adultery. Under Sudanese law, a pregnant woman can’t be executed until giving birth and raising the child for two years, according to Amnesty.
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