The U.S. State Department says a man gunned down this week in a Pakistani courtroom while standing trial on a charge of blasphemy was a U.S. citizen.
The statement issued late Thursday says Tahir Naseem was “lured to Pakistan” from his home in Illinois and entrapped by the country’s blasphemy laws, which international rights groups have sought to have repealed.
It did not elaborate on the circumstances in which Naseem came to be in the South Asian country.
Pakistan’s controversial blasphemy law calls for the death penalty for anyone found guilty of insulting Islam but in Pakistan the mere allegation of blasphemy can cause mobs to riot and vigilantes to commit murder.
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