<\/p>\n
Suppose you’re teaching school. A colleague dies. An angry mob decides you’re a witch so they decapitate you.<\/p>\n
It’s an unimaginable horror that recently happened in Papua New Guinea. But the new prime minister has vowed to repeal the “Sorcery Act” after a string of brutal public killings.<\/p>\n
Mr. O\u2019Neill, responding on Thursday to a question from a reporter about that killing, pledged to repeal the 1971 Sorcery Act, which criminalizes the practice of sorcery and recognizes the accusation of sorcery as a defense in murder cases. Critics of the law say that it encourages violence against people accused of being sorcerers by codifying black magic as a legal phenomenon.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have quite a lot of issues on the table, so please give us a chance to work on it,\u201d Mr. O\u2019Neill told the reporter. \u201cRealistically, a few sessions away, we will be able to put an act to Parliament to stop this nonsense about witchcraft and all the other sorceries that are really barbaric in itself.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
It’s refreshing to hear him call it “nonsense.” Small comfort for all the “sorcerers” killed and abused due to this archaic act. Plus, the horrific nature of this “nonsense” continues.<\/p>\n
Last July, police officers arrested 29 members of a witch-hunting gang who were murdering and cannibalizing people they suspected of being sorcerers.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Unbelievable. We live in the 21 century. There’s no excuse for this.<\/p>\n