With image of Maira Shahbaz (© Aid to the Church in Need)

Dear <<First Name>>

You kindly signed a petition last autumn calling on Prime Minister Boris Johnson to grant UK asylum to then 14-year-old Christian girl Maira Shahbaz suffering death threats in Pakistan. After long delays, Home Secretary Priti Patel finally told the House of Commons in June that she would meet advocates for Maira’s cause – Sir Edward Leigh MP and Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) – to urgently discuss the case. But more than a month has passed and, in spite of constant prompting, Priti Patel has still not offered a date for the meeting.

Meantime, the situation for Maira in Pakistan is becoming increasingly urgent. We at ACN are in regular touch with Maira and her family. Amid reports of suspicious people trying to hunt them down, for several months now, they have been too afraid to venture outside the small room where they are in hiding. They feel like ‘caged animals’. Hard-line political parties, who earlier had called for the death of fellow Christian Asia Bibi, have now called for Maira to be killed.

Please will you email Priti Patel asking her to honour her commitment and meet with ACN and Sir Edward Leigh to advance Maira’s cause?

We invite you to keep Maira and her family in your thoughts and prayers. They urgently need asylum.

Draft message for supporters to send Priti Patel

Dear Home Secretary,

In the House of Commons on 7 June 2021 you committed to meet with Sir Edward Leigh MP and Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) to discuss the case of Maira Shahbaz in Pakistan.

Maira is living under a constant death threat and extremists are calling for her to be killed. She and her family do not dare to venture outside the one room in which they are hiding.

The situation is urgent. Will you honour your commitment and meet with Sir Edward Leigh MP and ACN without delay?

With best wishes,

<<First Name>> <<Last Name>>

Click here to send this message to Priti Patel

HELP US SUPPORT THOSE IN NEED

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