ASIA BIBI’s lawyer, Saif ul Malook, has appealed to Germany to give Mrs Bibi and her family citizenship so that they can escape from Pakistan.

At a news conference in Frankfurt on Tuesday, Mr Malook told journalists that the family needed passports to leave the country.

Mrs Bibi, the Christian woman who has faced mob death threats since being acquitted of blasphemy charges at the end of last month, remains in protective custody in Pakistan.

The Bishop of Coventry, Dr Christopher Cocksworth, supported calls to grant UK asylum to Mrs Bibi (News, 16 November).

Mr Malook said: “The whole world is asking why she’s not coming. The answer is, first, that to leave a country you need a visa, or you require a passport of another country. If the German Chancellor directs her ambassador to give a passport to her, her husband, and her two daughters, conferring German nationality, nobody can stop her for one second because she is no longer Pakistani.

“So far, no government has come forward in such an open and free manner.”

The German government has said that it is one of several Western countries that are working to give refuge to Mrs Bibi and her family. Canada and Italy are among the others involved.

A former Conservative minister, Baroness Warsi, told the House of Lords on Tuesday that British Muslim communities were “fully supportive” of any asylum claim that Mrs Bibi might have, and that “she would be supported as she would be by all other communities in this country.”