Category Archives: Irrational religious authority

Joke of the year: Iran and Saudia Arabia seat contenders for UN Women’s Agency

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From CNS News

Late Entry May Foil Iran’s Bid for a Seat on Board of New U.N. Women’s Agency Wednesday, November 10, 2010
By Patrick Goodenough

(CNSNews.com) – Iran has some unexpected competition in its bid to be elected to the executive board of the new United Nations agency tasked with promoting the equality of women.

East Timor, one of the smallest countries in the Asia regional group, say it also will run for a seat on the board of U.N. Women.

Earlier the Asia regional group approved only 10 countries for the 10 seats earmarked for Asia on the 41-member board, which will approve projects and budgets for U.N. Women. That uncontested slate would have assured Iran of a spot in Wednesday’s vote.

A list of candidates provided to CNSNews Tuesday night shows that East Timor does not have the Asia group’s endorsement. Nonetheless its candidacy offers countries that object to Iran being on the board the opportunity to direct their votes elsewhere.

Queries sent to East Timor’s foreign ministry and its mission to the U.N. brought no response by press time.

Several other countries whose treatment of women has raised concerns among women’s rights advocacy groups do look set to get posts on the board, however.

They include Saudi Arabia, which is not standing on the Asia slate but is one of two countries (Mexico being the other) nominated for two seats set aside for emerging donor countries.

Among others with poor records on women’s rights and equality are Libya, Ethiopia and Cote d’Ivoire, all standing in the Africa group, which has put up a clean slate (10 candidates for 10 available seats); and Pakistan, one of the countries in the running for the Asia seats.

“We are relieved to know that the Asia group is in the end not offering Iran a free pass to the U.N. Women’s board and now has 11 candidates for 10 seats,” Philippe Bolopion, U.N. advocacy director for Human Rights Watch, said in response to queries Tuesday.

“In our view, what sets Iran apart is not just its dismal record on women’s rights but also the fact that it’s aggressively going after women’s rights advocates who dare to speak out against discriminatory laws in the country,” he added.

“Iran has time and again shown outright hostility to the very objectives U.N. Women was born to realize, and certainly should not be elected to its board.”

Wednesday’s vote will not involve the full 192-nation U.N. General Assembly but the 54-member Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), the U.N. organ that coordinates socio-economic and related affairs.

Like other U.N. bodies, ECOSOC is itself constituted along geographical lines, which has an impact on voting patterns: Africa controls 14 votes, the Western group 13, Asia 11, Latin America and the Caribbean 10 and Eastern Europe six votes.

ECOSOC last April ushered Iran into another U.N. entity dealing with women’s issues, the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW).

On that occasion, despite protests by more than 200 Iranian women’s rights activists, neither the U.S. nor any other member of ECOSOC raised an objection. As a result of their silence, Iran got the post “by acclamation.”

The Obama administration, a strong supporter of the new agency, has spoken out against Iran’s U.N. Women bid.

No suitability criteria

Officially called the U.N. Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women, U.N. Women will consolidate the work previously done by four separate U.N. divisions dealing with women’s issues.

Four months after it was established by the U.N. to great acclaim, the prospect of countries with poor records on women’s rights getting seats on the board has caused dismay.

The exiled Iranian rights activist and Nobel peace prize winner Shirin Ebadi told a press conference in New York Tuesday that giving places on the board to countries like Iran and Saudi Arabia was “like a joke.”

“This is a critical point for this agency, as it starts its work,” she said.

The France-based opposition group, National Council of Resistance of Iran, called Iran’s candidacy “an insult to all Iranian women and all women’s rights advocates around the world” and urged countries not to support the “misogynous regime.”

Thirty-five of the board’s members will come from the U.N.’s five regional groups. The remaining six seats are earmarked for contributing countries – four for the largest funders of the U.N. Women budget and two for developing state contributors (the category in which Saudi Arabia is a candidate).

The only criteria laid down for membership on the board are those relating to regional group and contribution status. The agency’s founding resolution contains no further requirements – for instance, that countries are expected or urged to nominate and vote for candidates with strong records on women’s rights.

“The question of who gets to sit on the board overseeing U.N. Women is a matter that is left up to member states,” Farhan Haq, a spokesman for Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, confirmed during a briefing Tuesday.

“We respect the right of member states to elect their own members of the board, and of course, it is certainly up to them.”

Haq added that all member states were expected “to uphold fundamental human rights.”

One current measure of suitability against which candidates for the U.N. Women board could be judged is a recently-released World Economic Forum report on the “Global Gender Gap,” a rating of how successfully countries have closed gaps between women and men in economic participation and opportunity, educational attainment, political empowerment and health and survival.

Out of 134 countries rated in the 2010 report, both Iran and Saudi Arabia were placed near the bottom, at positions 123rd and 129th respectively.

Other candidates in Wednesday’s election that scored badly in the Global Gender Gap were Pakistan (132nd place), Cote d’Ivoire (130th) and Ethiopia (121st).

Not all countries were rated; Libya and East Timor were among those not assessed.

Women prisoners in Iran

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CTV had the courage to actually do a bit, albeit a horribly watered down bit, on what women in Iranian prisons face, and in a way, sort of linked it to Islam when really, it should entirely be linked to Islam and the full extent of the horror imposed on women prisoners there based on the sharia and absurd notions of the afterlife and how women should be treated so that it will effect that post corporeal existence. In any case, kudos to CTV for even going this far in the totalitarian days we live in now as far as the media goes.

Scotland: No men allowed in ‘halal’ hair salon.

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From Herald Scotland, courtesy TROP

Now it’s halal hairdressing: a snip for Scottish Muslims

  • Mahida Iqbal
  • Mahida Iqbal struck on the idea of a ladies-only salon after offering an at-home hair service to her Muslim customers.

Exclusive: Helen McArdle

24 Oct 2010

With its frosted windows, CCTV cameras, and tightly monitored security entrance, it is going to be one of Aberdeen’s most secretive business enterprises.

So, you could be forgiven for wondering if the shop has something to hide.

Well, it does – its customers. Or rather it is the customers who want to remain hidden. For this is Scotland’s first ‘halal hairdressers’ – a beauty salon which conforms to the strict rules of Islam; a place were Muslim women who wear the veil or headscarf can be seen uncovered without the risk of the gaze of men.

Discreet Creative Hairdressing, scheduled to open in three weeks, is the brainchild of 21-year-old Mahida Iqbal and her husband of nine months, Fueb Mieh.

The salon will be a ‘man-free zone’. The frosted windows will stop any inquisitive men passing by from gawping at the clients. No-one can get in without passing through a secure buzzer entry system with CCTV. All this means that the Muslim ladies who have come for a new hair-do can remove their headscarves safe in the knowledge that only other women can see them.

Our salon is completely discreet, completely hidden from the public, from men, whereas the salons here, men still walk past and they can still see in or come in.

Mahida Iqbal

Iqbal hit on the idea when she began wearing the headscarf for the first time last year, although she credits her husband – a fellow entrepreneur who runs Indian takeaways – for coming up with the proposal.

“At first I was just going to open up a hair salon that was going to be ladies-only,” said Iqbal. “But then my husband suggested I should target the Muslim community because there isn’t a salon yet in Aberdeen that provides these services.” She spoke to Muslim women who wanted a ‘halal’ service, but had nowhere to go. “So I used to go and do homers for the ladies, or they would come to my house.”

While there are other salons in Scotland which offer a ladies-only service, Iqbal wants to offer something geared to the needs of the Muslim community.

She said: “There are hair salons in Glasgow that are ladies-only, but not like our salon. Our salon is completely discreet, completely hidden from the public, from men, whereas the salons here, men still walk past and they can still see in or come in. Ours has a buzzer entry system, and we’ve got CCTV so that we can see who’s actually approaching the door.

“We can allow people in and if there is a man there then we won’t let him in. And there’s the window frosting as well. There’s a big population in Aberdeen that are Muslim. There’s Pakistani, Bengali, African, black American, Arabic – there’s a very large Muslim community. And me myself, attending mosque and attending Muslim events, I’ve got to know a lot of the Muslim ladies, so I’m hoping to generate a lot of business by word of mouth.”

However, Iqbal is not content to stop at hair-styling alone. Her salon will be a haven to a whole range of the pampering needs for Muslim women, with a variety of specialist beauty techniques such as henna tattooing and facial threading – an ancient hair-removal technique – also on offer.

“We’ve got an African hair stylist because afro hair is different from European hair, so she’s going to be doing braiding and taking care of African clients. We’re going to have a make-up artist, a beautician, a nail technician, a henna artist, a threading specialist, and teeth whitening as well.”

“It is somewhere where customers can feel comfortable, feel pampered and relaxed, knowing that no-one is going to come in and disturb them,” Iqbal added. “Muslim husbands can feel relaxed knowing that their wife is safe, where no man is going to be able to see them, and then they can come home and show their beauty. Muslim clients have never experienced this ever. It’s a great feeling.”

Move over chops, now it’s the SMELL of bacon that offends Muslims

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From The Daily Mail U.K.

Cafe owner ordered to remove extractor fan ‘because smell of frying bacon offends Muslims’

By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 11:00 AM on 21st October 2010
A hard-working cafe owner has been ordered to tear down an extractor fan – because the smell of her frying bacon ‘offends’ Muslims.

Planning bosses acted against Beverley Akciecek, 49, after being told her next-door neighbour’s Muslim friends had felt ‘physically sick’ due to the ‘foul odour’.

Councillors at Stockport Council in Greater Manchester say the smell from the fan is ‘unacceptable on the grounds of residential amenity’.

Planning row: Cafe owner Beverley Akciecek has been ordered to tear down an extractor fan by the council because the smell of cooked bacon 'offends' MuslimsPlanning row: Cafe owner Beverley Akciecek has been ordered to tear down an extractor fan by the council because the smell of cooked bacon ‘offends’ Muslims

The fan has been in Beverley’s Snack Shack takeaway in the Shaw Heath area of the town for the past three years.

Mrs Akciecek and her husband Cetin, 50, – himself a Turkish Muslim – work more than 50 hours a week buying, preparing and cooking hot and cold sandwiches and hot-pots for their customers.

Today mother-of-seven Mrs Akciecek said she plans to appeal against the decision. Continue Reading →

Australia: male journalists ordered out of courtroom while Muslim woman testifies without niqab.

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I predicted this. I knew it would only be a matter of time before sharia standards would be granted formal legitimacy and folded into western court proceedings. This woman refused to remove her niqab at a previous hearing, so to satisfy her irrational sensibilities, the judge decided that sacrificing Australia’s own laws of gender equality to suit Islamic gender apartheid practices would be a fair cultural exchange.

From The Australian

Muslim woman removes niqab to give evidence, as male journalists are barred from court

  • From: AAP
  • October 18, 2010 5:28PM

A MUSLIM woman who sparked a national debate when she asked to give evidence in court wearing a niqab has uncovered her face to testify in a fraud trial.

Tasneem, whose last name has been suppressed by the Perth District Court, gave evidence for just 15 minutes today in the trial of Anwar Sayed.

Mr Sayed, 50, is accused of falsifying student numbers at the Muslim Ladies College of Australia in Kenwick, in Perth’s south, to fraudulently obtain part of $1.125 million the school received in state and federal government grants.

Tasneem, 36, has worn a niqab since the age of 17 and wanted to wear it while giving evidence in the trial.

But Judge Shauna Deane in August ruled she must remove the face-covering garment so that the jury could see her facial expressions.

Tasneem only removes the niqab when she visits the doctor and dentist, at customs in airports and when she has her driver’s licence photograph taken.

Judge Deane last week ruled that to make it easier for Tasneem to give evidence comfortably, men would be removed from the court.

The only men allowed in the courtroom while she gave her evidence today were male jurors, the judge’s usher, Mr Sayed and the lawyers.

While female journalists were allowed to stay in the court to report on Tasneem’s evidence, male journalists were ejected.

A lawyer representing Network Ten and the Seven and Nine networks made an application on Friday to alter the order so that male journalists could remain in court, but the application was rejected.

Giving evidence via video link today, Tasneem appeared comfortable, flanked by a security person and a support person, both of whom were female.

During her brief evidence she explained that she worked at the school as an Islamic studies teacher for two hours a day, five days a week.

Tasneem said that “from time to time” some students would go overseas on holiday or to visit family, mostly in Afghanistan, so it was possible they were enrolled at the school, but did not attend for long periods of time.

Mr Sayed is the director of Muslim Link Australia, which runs the Muslim Ladies College.

He allegedly knowingly signed a declaration that in the 2006/07 census year, more than 180 students were enrolled in the school when there were 80 to 100 fewer than that.

The school received about $164,000 from the state government and about $961,000 from the federal government.

The trial continues.

AAP

Shariah law has come to Canada.

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From The Ottawa Sun

Court decision puts veil over women’s rights

By EZRA LEVANT, QMI Agency

Last Updated: October 17, 2010 2:00am

It is illegal for a woman wearing a face-obscuring veil to board a plane in Canada. But a unanimous ruling last week by the Ontario Court of Appeal says it’s just fine for that same woman to give testimony in court with her face covered.

There’s more. Ontario’s highest court says veiled women can ask for an order to clear men out of the courtroom — any men in the public gallery, any male court staff, even her opponent’s lawyer, even the judge himself — in return for taking off her veil. It’s paragraph 85 of the ruling.

Shariah law has come to Canada.

Face-obliterating veils called niqabs are a medieval tool for gender apartheid. They destroy a woman’s identity. They turn her into an object, a chattel owned by her master — which is why they’re the norm in Saudi Arabia, where women have fewer rights than men and only slightly more than animals.

Burkas — an even more prison-like shroud, with just a tiny beekeeper’s screen to peek through — are the Taliban variety. Those are now allowed on the witness stand in Canada, too.

Rip the Ten Commandments off the wall, because we must have separation of church and state. But when the most un-Canadian expression of radical Islam walks in the court, our judges follow the Qur’an.

But that’s not fair to the Qur’an. No verse in that book requires face-covering. But our judges now say it’s a Charter right.

To their shame, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association intervened to support this. They have demanded Bibles be removed from schools and the Lord’s Prayer be banned from legislatures. But Muslim veils — a chastity belt for the face — have their support in a secular court.

The CCLA has found religion. And LEAF, the feminist law organization built with Canadian tax dollars, has a new view on a woman’s proper place. They argued for the niqab, too.

As National Post columnist Barbara Kay points out, a survey of Muslim women in France found 77% wear the veil out of fear of men.

Australian Imam Taj Din al-Hilali put it another way, in a sermon about rape: “If you take out uncovered meat and place it outside on the street … and the cats come and eat it … whose fault is it, the cats’ or the uncovered meat? The uncovered meat is the problem.”

LEAF supports covering up “the meat.” Now our courts do too.

The Ontario ruling came about because a Muslim woman alleged she was molested as a child by her uncle and her cousin in the 1980s. It’s a horrendous accusation and, if true, the woman deserves our sympathy and the accused deserve our most punitive punishment. But before we get there, there’s the matter of a trial.

In Canada, even accused rapists have the right to question their accuser and the court has the right to observe her demeanour. It’s why we don’t allow testimony from someone wearing a mask.

But this accuser didn’t want to take off her mask.

“It’s a respect issue, one of modesty and one of — in Islam, we call honour,” she told the judge at the preliminary inquiry “It’s to conceal the beauty of a woman.”

She had only been wearing a veil for about five years and the judge found her religious belief was “not that strong.” But “I would feel a lot more comfortable if I didn’t have to, you know, reveal my face.”

Sure, she took the veil off to get her driver’s licence. But that was important, you see. Not like accusing a man of a horrendous crime.

The judge told her to take off her veil. That’s what was over-ruled last week.

This could be great, says the Court of Appeal. The reliability of her veiled testimony could actually be better.

“Without the niqab … one could not expect her to be herself on the witness stand … her embarrassment and discomfort could be misinterpreted as uncertainty and unreliability.”

But it’s more than law. It’s politics, they say. Allowing the niqab “could be seen as a recognition and acceptance of those minority beliefs and practices.”

That’s exactly the problem.

In heaven, Aqsa Parvez is screaming again.

— Read Levant’s blog at ezralevant.com

Forced Muslim Marriage up in flames in the UK.

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From The Daily Mail U.K.

Pregnant new bride dies after being set on fire in garden

By Chris Brooke
Last updated at 7:56 AM on 16th October 2010

A pregnant woman has died after being found on fire in her garden.

Neighbours said the 23-year-old woman – named locally as Asiyah Khan – arrived in the country earlier this year and had an arranged marriage.

She was rarely seen outside the house, which she shared with her husband Naveed, mother-in-law and two sisters-in-law.

Scene: Police conduct their investigation in the street behind which the woman was found Scene: Police conduct their investigation in the street behind which the woman was found.

Police were investigating the incident yesterday and it was not clear whether Mrs Khan had set herself on fire or had been set alight by someone else. No one has been arrested in connection with her death.

Emergency services were called to the residential street in Bradford at 7.15pm on Thursday, but Mrs Khan was pronounced dead at the scene.

Neighbour Debbie Gregoire said the family returned home from a shopping trip to find the house locked. Naveed Khan climbed over the gate to find his wife’s body in the back garden. Continue Reading →

Niqab is the “British way”

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From The Telegraph U.K.

Islamic face-veil part of ‘British way of life’

The full Islamic face-veil is a part of the “British way of life” and should be celebrated along with religious symbols such as the crucifix, according to a report published today.

By Tim Ross, Religious Affairs Editor
Published: 8:30AM BST 16 Oct 2010
Islamic face-veil part of 'British way of life'

Politicians in France and Belgium have voted in favour of banning the full veil Photo: GETTY IMAGES

Opponents of the veil claim it oppresses women and presents a barrier between those who wear traditional dress and the rest of society.

But in a new report from think-tank Civitas, Alveena Malik, a former faith adviser to the last Labour government, said the test of whether religious symbols are appropriate should be based on whether they are practical.

Politicians in France and Belgium have voted in favour of banning the full veil, or “niqab”, and other European countries are thought to be considering similar action.

In a new report, Women, Islam and Western Liberalism, Mrs Malik said: “We in Britain need to take a different direction from others in Europe and to accept the veil as part of a modern British way of life.”

She continued: “The wearing of religious symbols, including the full veil, should be a fundamental human right of an individual in both the public and private sphere.

“The real test for religious symbols in the public sphere should always be: ‘Does the wearing of a symbol (such as the kirpan, turban, yarmulke, crucifix and the veil) hinder a citizen’s ability to perform their public civic duties?’”

Britain is in a “unique” position to embrace such a public display of faith because of the role the church plays in the affairs of the state and its “multicultural diversity”.

Mrs Malik was appointed by last government to a panel of faith advisers for the Department for Communities. She has overseen British Council guidance on “intercultural dialogue”.

The Stones.

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When I think of stones I think of The Rolling Stones. When these women think of stones, they think of death. In April of this year the United Nations elected Iran to its Commission on the Status of Women……

SkyNews

Iranian Stoning Film To Be Shown In London

11:44pm UK, Thursday October 14, 2010

Lisa Holland, World Affairs correspondent

A film portraying the real-life stoning of an Iranian woman is opening in London, but it’s a film the Iranian government does not want the world to see.

Sakineh Mohammadi-Ashtiani is sentenced to be stoned for adulteryThe film is dedicated to Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, facing execution in Iran.

It depicts a brutal form of punishment still sanctioned by Iran’s current hard-line regime.

The film’s director claims some European governments have been reluctant to support it – fearful of antagonising Iran’s regime, already at loggerheads with the west.

The film The Stoning Of Soraya M is based on the true story of a woman brutally killed after being falsely accused of adultery.

Soraya is stoned to death in her Iranian village under Islamic Sharia law.

The film’s director, Cyrus Nowrasteh, has dedicated the screening to Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani currently facing execution by stoning or hanging in Iran for adultery.

Cyrus NowrastehThe film’s director Cyrus Nowrasteh

Amnesty International UK director Kate Allen said: “The final scenes of The Stoning Of Soraya M are quite horrific and many viewers might want to turn away. I’d urge them not to.

“This is the cruel reality of execution by stoning; watch, be enraged, and take action to stop this inhumane practice.

“The case of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani has been taken up by people all over the world, who have protested and written letters to the Iranian authorities urging them to stop her execution by any method.

“We have to keep this pressure up and make it clear to Iran’s leaders that killing Sakineh would cause a global outrage.

“Stonings are thankfully rare in Iran but they represent the ugly tip of a very large iceberg.

“At least 190 people have already been executed this year in Iran, mostly by hanging and after unfair trials.

“Amnesty opposes the death penalty regardless of the method of execution.

“We are calling on the Iranian authorities to stop this execution, stop the use of stoning altogether and stop criminalising the sex lives of consenting adults.”

Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad accused the west of using the Ashtiani case to generate further opposition against it – at a time when Iran’s nuclear programme is drawing international condemnation and concern.

The Stoning Of Soraya M serves as a painful reminder of the ruthlesslness of the Iranian government – past and present.

Halal cat food. Really now. God cares what cats eat.

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When one reads an add for a company that sells specially prepared and blessed meat for cats, one must wonder exactly what kind of a ‘religion’ Islam actually is. I mean with literally thousands of years of Jews arguing over how many angels can dance on the head of a pin and every other kind of possible issue from the old testament, I bet not one of them once ever thought to argue that their pets had to eat Kosher foods.

Here is a link to a Halal pet food business. Remember, your cat can’t go to paradise and sniff and scratch it’s 72 virgins on couches of the finest silk with young boys fresh as pearls if a guy in a goofy hat doesn’t scream ‘Allahu Ackbar” while his food is being slaughtered.

If we cared at all, then yes, we would need “a short explanation”

More cultural enrichment in Canada: the importation of polygamy, child brides, forced marriages

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From The Ottawa Sun

Polygamy, child brides pose problems for immigration officials

By BRIAN LILLEY, Parliamentary Bureau

Last Updated: October 12, 2010 4:13pm

OTTAWA – Forced marriages, child brides, polygamy and arranged marriages between first cousins are some of the problems that Canadian immigration officials in Pakistan have to deal with.

The revelations are contained in a 26-page report prepared by Canadian officials working out of the immigration and visa office in the Pakistani capital of Islamabad. The report was obtained by immigration lawyer Richard Kurland through access to information legislation and supplied to QMI Agency.

“With few exceptions, the Islamabad spousal reunification programme involves Muslim proxy marriages arranged by the families, the vast majority of which take place between first cousins,” reads the report.

According to Kurland, polygamy is most common among wealthy Pakistani families trying to immigrant to Canada. Canadian officials often won’t reject an application just because a man has more than one wife, Kurland said.

“They say we can’t do this because you are polygamists so you have to divorce some, keep one and work it out domestically,” Kurland said. Kurland told QMI that often second or third wives will be sponsored into Canada as skilled workers for a business or as a maid for the household.

As for first cousins marrying, while the practice is not common in Canada due to a higher risk of birth defects, marrying your cousin is legal in this country.

“Marriages that are legal in Canada are legal for the purposes of immigration and sponsorship,” said Alykhan Velshi, a spokesman for Immigration Minister Jason Kenney.

Tazeen Ahmad, a British woman of Pakistani descent, produced a documentary earlier this year for Channel 4 called Dispatches: When Cousins Marry.

Ahmad documented the cultural reasons for the practice among British Pakistanis as well as the problems, such as a high rate of recessive gene disorders.

Canadian Court of Appeal ‘decides’ on niqabs in courtrooms

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From The Ottawa Sun

Putting face on religion

By MICHELE MANDEL, QMI Agency

Last Updated: October 13, 2010 10:08pm

TORONTO – It is a typically Canadian solution.

The Ontario Court of Appeal won’t ban Muslim witnesses from wearing a face veil. Nor will the highest court in the province grant them an automatic right to do so.

Instead, in its highly anticipated decision, the appeal court has ruled right down the middle, saying “each case must turn on its own facts.”

As long as it doesn’t prejudice a fair trial, the court ruled, Muslim women should have the religious right to wear their niqab when testifying.

But if a judge is convinced by the accused that he can’t properly defend himself if she’s testifying against him behind a veil, the witness must remove her niqab and allow the face-to-face confrontation that is the norm in Canadian courts.

Justice system

“The criminal justice system as it presently operates, and as it has operated for centuries, places considerable value on the ability of lawyers and the trier of fact to see the full face of the witness as the witness testifies,” wrote Justice David Doherty in the ruling released Wednesday morning on behalf of the three-judge panel.

“There is no getting around the reality that in some cases, particularly those involving trial by jury where a witness’s credibility is central to the outcome, a judge will have a difficult decision to make.”

It was not a clear-cut victory for any side, but one cautiously applauded by all.

“It’s a real step forward,” said David Butt, lawyer for N.S., the Toronto woman who was ordered to remove her niqab at a preliminary hearing. “This walks a middle ground that balances two very important, competing rights.”

N.S. came forward in 2007 and accused her uncle and cousin of sexually abusing her as a child. When the case went to a preliminary hearing in 2008, she said she wanted to testify while wearing her niqab. When the judge ruled against her, she took her case to the Ontario Court of Appeal in June.

In its 54-page decision, the three-judge appeal panel ruled that there needs to be a “case by case assessment” and for the first time set out guidelines for judges in these previously “uncharted waters”.

For N.S., the appeal court overturned her niqab ban and said she must be given a proper hearing to show why her religion requires her to cover all but her eyes.

The defence must also be allowed to call evidence on the issue before the judge decides if she can testify wearing her veil or whether accommodations can be made for her testimony — such as an all-female court.

“The court did not decide the crux issue of whether the niqab comes off or stays on,” said N.S.’ lawyer.

“On the other hand, the court has given us a very firm set of factors to guide us.”

The Criminal Lawyers’ Association had argued that a witness can’t be properly cross-examined if their face is concealed but was satisfied with the ruling.

“It is a paradigmatic, Canadian decision insofar as it strikes a very workable compromise rather than making a choice between two important competing values,” noted association president Paul Burstein. “Time will tell.”

Tarek Fatah, founder of the Muslim Canadian Congress, was relieved the court of appeal did not grant an automatic right to give testimony behind the veil, which he insists is a political, not a religious, symbol. But he was troubled the appeal court seemed to bend over backwards to accommodate women wearing a face covering many in the west see as backward and misogynistic.

“They do not think that Muslim women are women per se, but some kind of exotic species that they have to nurture in the laboratory that’s called Canada,” Fatah complained.

For its part, the appeal court wisely shied away from making a definitive ruling on a piece of cloth that continues to divide.

“The wearing of a niqab in public places is controversial in many countries including Canada,” Doherty wrote.

“The controversy raises important public policy concerns that have generated heated debate. Those difficult and important questions are not the focus of this proceeding and cannot and should not be resolved in this forum.”

mi************@******ia.ca

KitmanTV: MEMRI founder speaks in Geneva

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The founder and operator of the incalculably important MEMRI TV organization, that monitors Muslim and Arab media and subtitles it for the benifit of the wider world, spoke in early Oct. to a select group of people in Geneva Switzerland.

KitmanTV was present and was able to film the speech he gave and here made a synopsis of it, with the actual clips refered to interjected in the speech. This is a very important clip. Please feel free to embed on your own sites.

Aisha shows her new face to the world.

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From The Telegraph U.K.

Taliban oppression poster girl unveils new nose

A woman who became the poster girl of Taliban oppression in Afghanistan after being mutilated by her husband has unveiled her new face to the world.

By Toby Harnden in Washington
Published: 7:08PM BST 12 Oct 2010
Aisha

Aisha on the cover of TIME magazine before her surgery, left, and, right, after her prosthetic nose was fitted Photo: TIME/FILMMAGIC.

The image of Aisha, 19, without a nose, prompted a worldwide outpouring of sympathy after it appeared on the cover of Time Magazine accompanying an article highlighting the plight of women in Afghanistan.

She appeared before the cameras to receive an Enduring Heart award at a benefit for the Grossman Burn Foundation, which paid for her surgery, in Los Angeles.

Maria Shriver, wife of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s and California’s first lady, presented the award.

“This is the first Enduring Heart award given to a woman whose heart endures and who shows us all what it means to have love and to be the enduring heart,” Miss Shriver said.

Aisha, whose surname has never been disclosed, responded: “Thank you so much.”

When Aisha was 12, her father vowed to repay a debt by promising her in marriage to a Taliban fighter. She was handed over to the fighter’s family, abused and made to sleep in a stable with animals.

She was caught after trying to escape and her nose and ears were sliced off by her husband as a punishment.

“When they cut off my nose and ears, I passed out,” she told CNN. “In the middle of the night it felt like there was cold water in my nose. I opened my eyes and I couldn’t even see because of all the blood.”

After being left for dead in the mountains, she crawled to her grandfather’s house and was taken to an American medical facility.

Following time time at a shelter in Kabul, she was flown to the US by the Grossman Burn Foundation in August and stayed with an American family.

This month, she had a prosthetic nose fitted at the West Hills Hospital. Dr Peter H Grossman said they hoped to give Aisha a more “permanent solution”.

This might involve rebuilding her nose and ears using bone, tissue and cartilage from other parts of her body.