A doctor who is facing execution in Sudan for marrying a Christian gave birth to a baby girl in prison today.
Meriam Ibrahim, who has spent the past four months shackled to the floor in a disease-ridden jail, gave birth five days early.
The baby was born in the hospital wing at Omdurman Federal Women’s Prison in North Khartoum and is said to be healthy.
Her lawyer Mohaned Mustafa Elnour said: 'This is some good news in what has been a terrible ordeal for Meriam.
'I am planning to visit her with her husband Daniel later today. I think they are going to call the baby Maya.’
Meriam, 27, was sentenced to death by hanging earlier this month after being found guilty of converting from
Islam to Christianity and marrying a Christian man, U.S. citizen Daniel
Wani, who lives in Manchester, New Hampshire.She will receive 100 lashes before she is executed - sometime in the next two years.
Before the birth, Meriam made the defiant claim that she would rather die than give up her faith.
In a heart-wrenching conversation with her husband during a rare prison visit, Meriam told him: 'If they want to execute me then they should go ahead and do it because I’m not going to change my faith.’
An Islamic Sharia judge said she could be spared the death penalty if she publicly renounced her faith and becomes a Muslim once more.
Meriam insists she has always been a Christian and told her husband she could not 'pretend to be a Muslim' just to spare her life.
She told him: 'I refuse to change. I am not giving up Christianity just so that I can live.
'I know I could stay alive by becoming a Muslim and I would be able to look after our family, but I need to be true to myself.’
Daniel,
a 27-year-old biochemist, revealed his wife’s defiant stance
at his modest home in the dusty Sudanese capital city of Khartoum.Sitting beneath glamorous photographs of his wife taken at their wedding in December 2011, he said: 'My wife is very, very strong. She is stronger than me.
'When they sentenced her to death I broke down and tears were streaming down my eyes. Our lawyers were passing me tissues. But she stayed strong.
'She did not flinch when she was sentenced. It was amazing to see, particularly because she is the one facing the death penalty.’
Daniel was in Khartoum trying to arrange for Meriam and their 20-month-old son Martin to live with him in the US when his wife was arrested in September. She was three weeks pregnant with their second child.
She has been held since February in Omdurman Federal Women’s Prison, North Khartoum, with Martin.
at his modest home in the dusty Sudanese capital city of Khartoum.Sitting beneath glamorous photographs of his wife taken at their wedding in December 2011, he said: 'My wife is very, very strong. She is stronger than me.
'When they sentenced her to death I broke down and tears were streaming down my eyes. Our lawyers were passing me tissues. But she stayed strong.
'She did not flinch when she was sentenced. It was amazing to see, particularly because she is the one facing the death penalty.’
Daniel was in Khartoum trying to arrange for Meriam and their 20-month-old son Martin to live with him in the US when his wife was arrested in September. She was three weeks pregnant with their second child.
She has been held since February in Omdurman Federal Women’s Prison, North Khartoum, with Martin.
The authorities will not release Martin into the care of his father because they claim he is a Muslim too.
She spends much of her time shackled to the floor, is not receiving enough nutrition in her food to cope with the rigours of a difficult pregnancy and is rarely allowed outside.
Both she and her bewildered son have contracted various illnesses because of the poor sanitation at the jail.
She spends much of her time shackled to the floor, is not receiving enough nutrition in her food to cope with the rigours of a difficult pregnancy and is rarely allowed outside.
Both she and her bewildered son have contracted various illnesses because of the poor sanitation at the jail.
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