Freedom is on the march ..... say the wrong thing in Afghanistan and die?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/10/AR2005121001138.html

Post-Taliban Free Speech Blocked by Courts, Clerics
Jailed Afghan Publisher Faces Possible Execution
By Griff Witte
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, December 11, 2005; Page A24

<KABUL, Afghanistan -- When Ali Mohaqeq Nasab returned to Afghanistan last year after a long exile, he thought the atmosphere had opened up enough to raise questions about women's rights and the justice system in his country's nascent democracy.

But now the magazine publisher's provocative essays have put him at the mercy of that system -- imprisoned on blasphemy charges and facing possible execution.

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Karzai's spokesman, Karim Rahimi, said the government strongly supports free speech but cannot do anything to influence the courts. "The judiciary system is entirely independent," he said.>