Islamic clerics in Pakistan are complaining to government officials who are considering changes to the nation’s blasphemy laws.

A group of Muslims gathered at an event they called a “seminar for protection of the prophet’s dignity” and are calling for the legislators to stop adding the word “intention” to the law that many Muslims use to bully Christians.

“The new bill rejects all sayings by the ‘holy prophet,'” former Pakistani justice Mian Nazir Akhtar stated. “When it comes to the sanctity of the prophet, the implementation of all man-made laws become different. Those who insult him have no rights, including no right to live. There is no need for trial or hearings.”

Many Christians have been accused of blasphemy by Muslims in Pakistan for various reason including a desire by the Muslims to seize their property to punish them for their Christian faith.  Muslim mobs routinely attack Christians accused of blasphemy and kill them without any court trial.

Currently 40 people sit on Pakistan’s death row on accusations of blasphemy including Asia Bibi, jailed because she drank water from a well that Muslim women wanted to use.

“The blasphemy law on its face flatly violates both freedom of religion and freedom of expression. Worse still, Pakistan vigorously applies this law,”  Katrina Lantos Swett, the chair of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom said. “Moreover, the weight of this law falls disproportionately on members of religious minority communities, such as Christians, Hindus, Sikhs, and Ahmadis.

“In addition, enforcement of such laws emboldens religious extremist groups and their sympathizers to assault these minorities — as seen most recently when terrorists slaughtered Ismaili Muslims on a bus,” she continued. “And finally, Pakistan’s zealous enforcement of these laws is in contrast to the pronounced lack of zeal bringing to justice those responsible for such attacks.”

Some Muslim leaders have threatened a fatwa against those supporting the change to the law.