The Wall Street Journal-20080201-Journalism Is Not a Capital Crime

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Journalism Is Not a Capital Crime

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Ever since the post-9/11 American invasion, the Afghan government has taken great pains to distance itself from the oppressive and unforgiving rule of the Taliban. Afghan leaders have pointed to greater personal freedom and improvements in infrastructure, education and health care as successes of the country's nascent democracy.

But last week we learned that Sayed Parwez Kaambakhsh, a young journalism student, has been sentenced to death for distributing an article that, religious clerics in Afghanistan say, violates the tenets of Islam. The article reportedly addresses polygamy and asks why Muslim men are allowed to have multiple wives but women are not allowed to marry more than one man. Mr. Kaambakhsh, who has been in custody since October 2007, was given his sentence by a panel of three judges on the basis that the article is blasphemous.

Much of the investigation has focused on whether Mr. Kaambakhsh actually wrote the article, titled "The Koranic Verses that Discriminate Against Women." Mr. Kaambakhsh contends that he did not author the article, but that he merely printed it off the Internet and distributed it to fellow students at Balkh University in northern Afghanistan. In fact, last week, an Iranian Internet journalist living in Europe claimed authorship of the article, and expressed his dismay at Mr. Kaambakhsh's troubles.

But the focus on whether or not Mr. Kaambakhsh penned the article misses the point entirely. It assumes that if he in fact did write it, then he is deserving of the sentence. The real questions that must be asked are: Is post-Taliban Afghanistan a country that executes citizens for peacefully questioning some aspect of Islam? What about all the rhetoric of Afghan freedom and democracy? Wouldn't executing Mr. Kaambakhsh render it embarrassingly hollow? For how can Afghanistan claim that it is on the path to being a free, democratic state, and then put to death one of its own citizens for reasons that evoke, rather chillingly, the darkest days of the Taliban?

This case is about much more than the fate of Mr. Kaambakhsh. For the past seven years, Afghan leaders have sought to enlist the help of the international community in the efforts to rebuild a country still reeling from nearly three decades of war, anarchy and extremism. President Hamid Karzai has repeatedly, and quite rightly, called for a genuine and long-term commitment on the part of the world's wealthy nations, a plea that I, among other Afghans, have echoed publicly. But Afghanistan must show the world that it has broken from its recent past of zealotry and intolerance.

In 2006, the country had such an opportunity with the case of Abdul Rahman, a 41-year-old Afghan man who was put on trial and faced a death sentence for the crime of converting to Christianity. His case came to an end when, under tremendous international pressure that included a plea to President Karzai from Pope Benedict XVI, Afghan lawmakers allowed Mr. Rahman to flea to Italy where he was granted asylum. At the time, I thought that moderate Afghan leaders had wasted an opportunity to stand their ground and demonstrate their regime's respect for freedom of thought, religion and expression -- the pillars of any democracy.

Mr. Kaambakhsh's case presents another opportunity for Afghanistan to demonstrate that ruling by the strict word of Shariah -- at the expense of tolerance, compassion and freedom -- is a thing of the past. It is a chance for Afghanistan to show the world that it will abide by the fundamental principles of democracy, and to validate its repeated calls for financial support from the international community.

Mr. Kaambakhsh's case is now under review by an appeals court, even as Afghanistan's upper house of parliament this week lauded the death sentence and condemned international humanitarian efforts to have it annulled as "international interference." But President Karzai has the final say in the matter.

I join groups such as Reporters Without Borders in calling for President Karzai to do whatever is within his powers to spare Mr. Kaambakhsh. If this death sentence is carried out, it would not only badly damage the credibility of his government, but it would once again raise serious questions about the viability of democracy in Afghanistan, and vindicate the skeptics at a time when the nation critically needs believers.

Should Mr. Kaambakhsh be executed, it would be a tragedy not only for him and his family, but for all of us who hold out hope for a freer, more prosperous, more enlightened Afghanistan.

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Mr. Hosseini, a goodwill envoy to UNHCR, is the author of "The Kite Runner" (Riverhead, 2003) and "A Thousand Splendid Suns" (Riverhead, 2007).