The Freedom From Religion Foundation wired $20,000 to Taslima Nasrin on March 4, in rapid response to her appeal to the freethought and humanist community for help after her friend, Avitji Roy, was brutally hacked to death on the streets of Bangladesh and his wife was severely injured. After Roy’s death, two other atheist bloggers have since been killed on the streets of Bangladesh, including one who had championed Nasrin.
Nasrin, a physician, novelist, poet and freethought/feminist writer, was the target of an Islamic terrorist organization in Bangladesh.
“I vividly remember Taslima Nasrin telling an international atheist conference in Germany three years ago that she was ‘ woman without a country.’ She told us the freethought community was her country,” said Annie Laurie Gaylor, FFRF co-president.
“Our community will need to be prepared to give emergency help as we increasingly see atheists and critics of religion persecuted, imprisoned and slaughtered,” Gaylor proposed at last weekend’s 2015 International Atheist Conference in Cologne, Germany, in publicly announcing the grant on May 24.
"Already this year we’ve seen unprecedented attacks against atheists and critics of religion worldwide," noted Dan Barker, FFRF co-president. “Taslima Nasrin is targeted for death. There are at least 13 nations where you can technically be put to death for espousing atheism."
Nasrin was FFRF’s 2002 Freethought Heroine. The Bengali author and physician has been subject to a series of fatwas, or religious sanctions, condemning her to death in 1994 for blasphemy. She had sought refuge in other countries, most recently living in India, but subject to increasing threats there.