Correspondence Relating to Executions in Turkey for Apostacy from IslamismVarious
Islamic
Correspondence Relating to Executions in Turkey for Apostacy from Islamism
Various
Apostasy -- Islam; Executions (Islamic law)
Rifaat Pasha, however, seemed to me convinced that after the noise
which has been made in Europe, a scene similar to that of the
Armenian cannot be renewed. The measures which the Government are
about to adopt have for their object to avoid a trial, and without a
trial no one can be condemned to death. The Armenian was tried at
the Mehkemé called that of the Stambol Effendi, before being sent to
the Porte. The Kiatib who is in prison for having uttered
blasphemies against Mahomet, was judged at the Mehkemé of Salonica,
before he was sent to Constantinople; and the Supreme Council has
declared him worthy of death, although he has not yet been
judicially and formally condemned here. The circumstance of the
Kiatib having already been tried and convicted of uttering blasphemy
against the name of Mahomet puts his life in the most imminent
danger.
I have, &c.,
(Signed) FREDERICK PISANI.
No. 10.
_Sir Stratford Canning to the Earl of Aberdeen.--(Received December
5_.)
(Extract.) _Buyukderé, November_ 17, 1843.
I am happy to state that a serious and salutary impression has been
made upon the Turkish Government by the communication of your
Lordship's instruction respecting the Armenian decapitated in the
streets of Constantinople. Preceded as that communication was by the
delivery of M. Guizot's impressive note, and followed, as I believe
it to have been, by the presentation of Baron Bülow's instruction to
M. de Le Coq, the Porte has felt, even in the absence of any similar
declaration from the Austrian and Russian Legations, that she cannot
with prudence or safety repeat an atrocity tending so directly to
excite the indignant feelings of Christendom against her. I have not
received, nor indeed have I yet demanded, an official answer to my
remonstrance. M. de Bourqueney, though, like myself, without
instructions on that point, has made the demand, but, at my request,
he has abstained from pressing it, agreeing, on reflection, with me,
that it would be advisable at all events to afford time for M. de
Titow to hear from his Government, and to take a step more or less
in harmony with ours. It remains indeed to be considered whether it
would be prudent, even with that advantage, to insist upon receiving
a formal answer. I have already forwarded to your Lordship's office
the substance of Rifaat Pasha's remarks, and they convey an
assurance that the Porte will in future find means to avoid the
application of the law in cases like that which proved fatal to the
unfortunate Armenian.
The apparent consequences of what has been done in this matter are,
a Ministerial understanding that occasions of calling the law into
action as to religious offences involving a capital punishment are
for the future to be avoided, and a proclamation addressed to the
Turkish authorities in Roumelia for the better treatment and
protection of the Sultan's Christian subjects.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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