|
Islam online - November 12, 2007
Aussie Muslim terror case dropped
CAIRO — A high-profile terrorism case against an Australian Muslim medical student was thrown out Monday, November 12, after a judge ruled that intelligence agents had preached law by falsely "kidnapping" and detaining the young man, reported the Sydney Herald Morning.
"I am satisfied that B15 and B16 committed the criminal offences of false imprisonment and kidnapping at common law and also an offence under section 86 of the Crimes Act," said New South Wales Supreme Court judge Michael Adams, referring to officers from the Australian Security Intelligence Organization (ASIO).
Izhar ul-Haque, 24, was charged in April 2004 with receiving weapons training from the Pakistan-based group Lashkar-e-Taiba, which Australia lists as a terrorist group, during a visit to Pakistan in 2003.
But Adams found that two ASIO officers had broken the law in deliberately trying to coerce Izhar ul-Haque into making false confessions.
Investigations showed that the man was intimidated, blackmailed, came under unbearable pressures and threatened with serious consequences if he did not "cooperate."
Federal police had further tried to recruit ul-Haque to be their informant among Sydney Muslims.
Adams concluded that the officers' misconduct meant subsequent police records of interview with ul-Haque were inadmissible as evidence, forcing Australia's Federal Police (AFP) to withdraw its case against ul-Haque just before a trial jury was to be empanelled.
"It was a gross interference by the agents of the state with the accused's legal rights as a citizen," he said.
Intelligence and police have violated the rights "which he still has whether he be suspected of criminal conduct or not, and whether he is Muslim or not," he added.
"Moronic Prosecution"
Ul-Haque has declined to speak to the media about his ordeal, trying to re-establish himself from a long nightmare.
But his lawyer, Adam Houda, blasted what he called a "moronic prosecution", flawed from the very start.
"From the beginning, this was no more than a show trial designed to justify the billions of dollars spent on counter-terrorism," he said. "It has been one bungled prosecution after another."
Houda said ul-Hague's case is another bolt in Australian police's record, citing the flawed terror case of Indian doctor Mohamed Haneef earlier this year.
Haneef, 27, was working at a state hospital on Australia's Gold Coast when arrested in July and charged with "recklessly" supporting a terrorist group linked to the failed terror attacks in Lond the same month.
After three weeks of investigations, Haneef was cleared.
The dropping of charges against ul-Haque was also met with relief from Australia's Muslim minority.
"From the start of this case most people could not believe what was going," Keysar Trad from the Islamic Friendship Association Trad told Australia's ABC News. "We just couldn't believe that in Australia this sort of thing could happen to a young medical student."
Australia, a close ally of the US in the so-called "war on terror", has gradually toughened anti-terrorism laws since 2001.
Muslims, who make up 1.5 percent of Australia's 20 million population, have long complained of bearing the brunt of the draconian terror measures.
They blamed the incumbent John Howard government, whose government now trails badly in the polls ahead of the November 24 general election, for fostering an image of the minority as the enemy within.
http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=Article_C&cid=1193049672242&pagename=Zone-English-News/NWELayout
IslamOnline.net - Nov. 11, 2007
Islamophobia in Danish Elections
COPENHAGEN — The far-right Danish People's Party (DPP) has stepped up its anti-immigrants campaign ahead of this week's legislative elections with more electioneering posters antagonizing Muslims, who make up the largest immigrant minority in Denmark.
"There is every reason to tighten the screws (against Muslim immigrants), because Danish values are under pressure," said deputy head of the party Peter Skaarup, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP) Sunday, November 11.
The DPP election posters signified the party's xenophobic agenda with one poster showing a group of hijab-clad women under the headline: "Follow the Country's Traditions and Customs or Leave."
Another one shows a hijab-wearing woman withdrawing money from a cash dispenser machine carrying the logo of the Welfare Benefits Office, with a caption reading: "Make Demands on the Foreigners. Now They Must Contribute!"
A third poster went far, featuring a hand drawing portray of a man the party called Prophet Muhammad (Peace and Blessings be Upon Him) and captioned: "Freedom of Expression is Danish. Censorship is Not. Defend Danish Values."
The poster was referring to the 2005 crisis sparked by the publication of 12 cartoons that lampooned the Prophet in Denmark's mass-circulation Jyallands Posten.
Danish analysts say the DPP, a key parliamentary ally for the centre-right government of Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen, is fostering a culture like Nazi Germany during World War II.
"The DPP is not Nazi, but its ideology, with its xenophobic extreme nationalism, resembles Nazism, since it tries to stamp out a minority," Therkel Straede, a Holocaust expert at Syddansk University, told AFP.
The DPP, the third-largest political force in Denmark, has recently put forward a string of draft laws calling for a ban on hijab in public places and denying Muslims special worship areas in the workplace.
The party has also called for a ban on halal meat in daycare centres and on separate locker rooms for Muslim schoolgirls.
Hot Issue
Immigration ranks among the greatest concerns of Danish voters in the run-up to Tuesday's legislative elections to elect 179 lawmakers for a four-year term.
The popularity of Syrian-born Danish Muslim politician Naser Khader set to play kingmaker in the election and may herald a shift in anti-foreigner sentiment in Denmark, which has some of Europe's toughest immigration curbs.
Polls show Khader's New Alliance party has enough support to play the decisive role after a battle between the governing centre-right coalition and the Social Democrat-led opposition that is too close to call.
A Megafon opinion poll released late Friday showed the centre-left opposition with 87 seats against 83 for the ruling centre-right.
And four more polls published Saturday showed the centre-right coalition and the centre-left opposition neck-and-neck.
Rasmussen has remained in power since 2001 thanks to the support of the far-right, and though the party has not formally been part of the ruling coalition it has succeeded in pushing through tighter immigration and refugee laws.
The number of refugees arriving in Denmark each year has plummeted since Rasmussen took power, falling from more than 10,000 in 2001 to fewer than 2,000 last year.
The number of immigrants admitted to the country for family regroupings has taken an equally dramatic nose-dive, from 14,140 in 2001 to 4,198 last year.
Islam is Denmark's second largest religion after the Lutheran Protestant Church, which is actively followed by four-fifths of the country's population.
Denmark is home to a Muslim minority of 200,000, making up three percent of the country's 5.4 million population.
http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=Article_C&cid=1193049638844&pagename=Zone-English-News/NWELayout
The Canadian Press - November 21, 2007
Compromise over Muslim woman's skirt
A compromise has been reached in the case of a Muslim woman suspended from her job at (Toronto’s) Pearson International Airport because of the length of her skirt.
Halima Muse was suspended in August from her job as a screener with a security firm for wearing a skirt longer than the knee-length one supplied with her uniform.
The Teamsters union says Garda has agreed to offer the 33-year-old woman a full-time administrative job in civilian attire at her previous salary and to pay her full back pay for the time she was suspended.
The union says Muse will remain in the new position until the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority completes a review of the uniform policy.
Muse, a practicing Muslim, wanted to conform with the Islamic dress code that requires clothes to cover the body except the face, hands and feet.
The Teamsters union and the Canadian Council on American-Islamic Relations said Monday that they filed a religious discrimination complaint on behalf of Muse.
http://www.thestar.com/printArticle/278596
BBC - November 29, 2007
British teacher jailed in Sudan for insulting Islam
Khartoum, Nov 29, 2007 - A British teacher was found today guilty in Sudan of insulting religion after she allowed her primary school class to name a teddy bear Mohammad (after the name of Prophet Mohmmad).
Gillian Gibbons, 54, from Liverpool, has been sentenced to 15 days in prison and will then be deported. She escaped conviction for inciting hatred and showing contempt for religious beliefs, and will now appeal.
In September, Mrs Gibbons allowed her class of primary school pupils to name the teddy bear Mohammad as part of a study of animals and their habitats.
The court heard that she was arrested on Sunday after another member of staff at Unity High School complained to the Ministry of Education.
The BBC's Adam Mynott, in Khartoum, said Mrs Gibbons apologized to the court for any offence she may have caused.
The school's director, Robert Boulos, told the AP news agency: "It's a very fair verdict, she could have had six months and lashes and a fine, and she only got 15 days and deportation."
He said Mrs Gibbons would only serve another 10 days in prison, having already spent five in custody since her arrest.
Foreign Secretary David Miliband has expressed "in the strongest terms" the UK's concern at her detention.
Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams said he could not "see any justification" for the sentence, calling it an "absurdly disproportionate response" to a "minor cultural faux pas".
The Federation of Student Islamic Societies (Fosis), which represents more than 90,000 Muslim students in the UK and Ireland, said it was "deeply concerned" at what was a "gravely disproportionate" verdict.
The federation's president, Ali Alhadithi, said: "What we have here is a case of cultural misunderstandings, and the delicacies of the matter demonstrate that it was not the intention of Gillian Gibbons to imply any offence against Islam or Muslims.
BBC reported on Nov. 30: Crowds of people have marched in the Sudanese capital Khartoum to call for a tougher sentence for a British teacher jailed for insulting religion.
|
