Doctors in a hospital in Pakistan deny allegations of beating a Christian man to death over simple request for treatment. Suneel Saleem, 34 years old, Christian, died after incurring several injuries over a commotion with the staff from the said hospital.
Saleem went to the hospital to make sure that his sister, Kiran will get medical attention as she is pregnant. Kiran claimed that when they got there, they were discriminated because they knew she is a Christian as she wore a crucifix necklace.
Kiran also added that the doctors shouted at her, cursed her and even hit her with documents. One of the doctors even asked a nurse to "teach her a lesson" by injecting a dose which caused her pain.
When Saleem asked to see his sister, security guards took him to a different room with group of doctors. The doctors apparently beat him up leading him to lose consciousness and incur several fractures. Saleem did not recover from the beating and was announced as dead at the same hospital.
Saleem's family filed a police report that names Dr. Salman Haseeb and other four doctors for killing Saleem. Haseeb, however denied the allegations and was not arrested.
"We belong to a noble profession and murder is a dangerous charge. The family is playing religious and ethnic cards to conceal the real facts. They are the real anti-state elements," the doctor said in a statement. "Our hospitals do not discriminate on the basis of nationality and faith," he added, citing that a number of hospital staffers are also Christians.
Haseeb also said that the family was the first to attack the security guards and insisted that no doctors harmed the family.
Meanwhile, according to Open Doors, Christians in Pakistan increasingly suffer from discrimination, attacks and mistreatment. Each year, an average of 700 female Christians are abducted and raped of Muslim men in Pakistan. These incidents have prevented more Christians to profess their faith publicly as they become targets of persecution.
