Sayad Parvez Kambaksh is a journalism student at Balkh University in Afghanistan. Last year, he downloaded a paper criticising Islam off the internet and discussed it with his lecturers and classmates. And for that, he has been sentenced to death. The death sentence has since been endorsed (in a stunning violation of judicial independence) by the Afghan Parliament's upper house.
Currently, the Independent is running a petition urging the UK government to put all possible pressure on the Afghan government to prevent Sayad's execution. You can sign it here. But it's worth remembering that New Zealand also has troops in Afghanistan and is propping up the theocratic government which is doing this. We too should be applying all possible pressure - including the threat to withdraw support - to get the Afghan government to abide by basic human rights standards such as freedom of speech, freedom of religion, the ban on the death penalty and the right to a fair trial. So, it might be worth dropping an email to the Prime Minister or Foreign Minister as well.
