Afghan sentenced to death after sharing Web printouts

AFGHAN SENTENCED TO DEATH AFTER SHARING WEB PRINTOUTS
[SOURCE: C-Net|News.com, AUTHOR: Anne Broache]
A 23-year-old Afghani journalism student is facing a death sentence in his home country for distributing articles allegedly critical of Islam that he had printed from a Web site, according to various news reports. According to the Associated Press, the judges arrived at their decision by citing Article 130 of the Afghan Constitution, which calls for "judicial discretion" when there is no provision in the constitution or other national laws to deal with a certain matter. Court head Shamsurahman Momand was quoted by AFP as defending the decision on Wednesday, saying the student had been found to be "insulting Islam and Prophet Mohammad." Local and international press freedom groups, such as Reporters Without Borders and the National Journalists Union of Afghanistan, immediately condemned the verdict as a violation of freedom of expression and called on Afghan President Hamid Karzai to step in to overturn the ruling.
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* Death Sentence for Afghan Student
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/24/world/middleeast/24afghan.html?_r=1&ref=todayspaper&oref=slogin