§ Mr. DILLONasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he will lay upon the Table the text of the Fetwa issued by the Grand Mufti relative to the death sentence on Wardani?
§ Sir EDWARD GREYThe Fetwa of the Grand Mufti is in the form of a letter to the President of the Cairo Assize Court, and runs as follows:—
'I have duly received Your Excellency's letter dated the 18th May, and have examined the documents annexed thereto concerning the accusation against Ibrahim Nassef El-Wardany of having assassinated Boutros Pasha Ghali with premeditation, which you 1612W sent me for my opinion thereon. The answer is: It is laid down in the works on the Sharia that homicide deserving punishment of death, according to the Sharia, must be by blows from a sharp weapon or other similar instrument capable of separating the divers parts of the body. That death must have been the actual (immediate) consequence of the blows dealt by the offender to the victim. That the assassin must be of sound mind and of full age, and the life of the victim for ever immune as regards the assassin. That the homicide must be unjust, and the assassin must not be in one of the situations in which the death penalty is excluded by the Sharia. Judgment must be delivered in conformity with the Sharia, fulfilling all the conditions of validity required by the Sharia, in an action at law valid according to the rules of the Sharia, brought by one party against another party, recognised as such by the Sharia. Such are the provisions laid down by the Hanafite jurists. It results from the documents referred to, which are forwarded to me, that some of the conditions above indicated are not fulfilled in the crime in question.