Pakistan’s prime minister is Nawaz Sharif. He is not a woman. Maybe you are thinking of Bangladesh, Daphne.

The last time Pakistan had a woman prime minister was in 1996 Like all the other prime ministers since the Indo-Pakistani war, she did not survive a full term and was dismissed by the then president before being assassinated in 2007 while on the campaign trail.

Pakistan’s blasphemy laws are used so broadly that the civil courts might as well be sharia ones. Those who commit crimes in the name of religion rarely get more than a slap on the wrist.

My reading tip for the moment is Trials: On Death Row in Pakistan by Isabel Buchanan. It’s very insightful.

http://www.randomhouse.com.au/books/isabel-buchanan/trials-on-death-row-in-pakistan-9780224102100.aspx

Two countries have populations which are 100% Muslim: Saudi Arabia and Tunisia. In the first, women are beaten, stoned & c & c (incidentally, so are men, who are lashed). In the second, they are not, but instead run about town in high heels, strappy tops, tight skirts and have office jobs where they work with men and go out to restaurants and cafes.

So is the religion to blame? Obviously not, because if that were the case, Tunisia would be like Saudi Arabia. It is the social values that are to blame, with religion used as the excuse.

Without the religion, women would still have been dominated: tribal laws would have been used as the justification instead.

Why did Maltese law rule that women lost their autonomy on marriage, right up until 1993 – because of religion? No, because of the socio-cultural values of Maltese society that dictated how women were of less value than men, and that the man is the head of the family.

Thailand’s Muslim population is not tiny at 10%. In Indonesia, Islam is the dominant religion at around 90%. But these are situations you prefer to overlook as you pursue your cartoon characterisation of Islam. One of the first things you should do is pop across the water to Tunis.

I invite you to grow up and get an education. Sharia courts exist only in theocracies. Do they have sharia courts in Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Turkey, Thailand, Jordan, Pakistan (where the prime minister is a woman) & c & c. Obviously not. They have shariah courts in Saudi Arabia.

You also have a lot to learn about the history of your own country. Right up 1993 – yes, 1993 – women lost almost all their autonomy on marriage in Malta. That autonomy was ceded at law to their husband, whether they liked it or not. Their husband could even sell the roof over their heads and get passports for their children and take them out of the country, without his wife’s consent.

So the fact that in sharia courts a woman’s word is worth half that of a man has no influence on there condition?
Sharia courts also give twice the inheritance to males

The fact that Muhammad himself claimed that a woman should never refuse sex to her husband doesn’t influence male mentality?

The fact that men are allowed multiple wives and women not, doesn’t effect the power balance in the marriage?

The fact that boys are thought a chauvinist doctrine during all there childhood doesn’t influence there behaviour as adults?

The fact that the founder of Islam claimed it was gods will for his followers to take infidel women as sex slaves doesn’t objectify women?

verses like this don’t have anything to do according to you with oppression of women?

The Quran in Sura 4:34 says:
If you fear highhandedness from your wives, remind them [of the teaching of God], then ignore them when you go to bed, THEN HIT THEM

The problems in Turkey are not driven by religion, but by personal ambition.

How does a woman become prime minister in a Muslim country ‘where women are oppressed because of Islam’?

http://www.pmo.gov.bd/

You need to learn to distinguish between social organisation and religion. You can’t blame Roman Catholicism for the oppression of women in Malta until the end of the 20th century. Roman Catholicism’s teachings on the subordinate role of women simply found fertile ground in a society where women were oppressed already. They did not find similarly fertile ground in the north of Europe, where what was essentially tribal organisation gave women more autonomy.

As soon as there is a Muslim majority anywhere, yes, that’s what happens. Even where democracy was established 100 years ago – look at Turkey. Like I say, you milk-and-water liberals can’t see the elephant.