Category Archives: War on modernity

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

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”.

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.

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.

Sharia in Chechnya: women attacked for not wearing head scarves

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From The Province, courtesy TROP

Women targeted in Chechnya

Reuters August 22, 2010

Many women in Russia’s volatile Chechnya region said on Friday they had been harassed and some physically harmed by bands of men for not wearing head scarves during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan.

Against the backdrop of a spreading Islamist insurgency, many fear that growing interest in radical Islam could fuel separatism in the volatile North Caucasus, where the Kremlin watches uneasily as sharia law eclipses Russian.

Residents and witnesses told Reuters that bearded men in traditional Islamic dress have been roaming the streets both on foot and in cars since Ramadan started on Aug. 11, demanding bare-headed women wear a head scarf. Continue Reading →

Child torture: FGM on the rise despite being illegal

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From The Guardian U.K. Observer

British girls undergo horror of genital mutilation despite tough laws

Female circumcision will be inflicted on up to 2,000 British schoolgirls during the summer holidays – leaving brutal physical and emotional scars. Yet there have been no prosecutions against the practice.

Like any 12-year-old, Jamelia was excited at the prospect of a plane journey and a long summer holiday in the sun. An avid reader, she had filled her suitcases with books and was reading Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban when her mother came for her. “She said, ‘You know it’s going to be today?’ I didn’t know exactly what it would entail but I knew something was going to be cut. I was made to believe it was genuinely part of our religion.”

She went on: “I came to the living room and there were loads of women. I later found out it was to hold me down, they bring lots of women to hold the girl down. I thought I was going to be brave so I didn’t really need that. I just lay down and I remember looking at the ceiling and staring at the fan.

“I don’t remember screaming, I remember the ridiculous amount of pain, I remember the blood everywhere, one of the maids, I actually saw her pick up the bit of flesh that they cut away ’cause she was mopping up the blood. There was blood everywhere.”

Some 500 to 2,000 British schoolgirls will be genitally mutilated over the summer holidays. Some will be taken abroad, others will be “cut” or circumcised and sewn closed here in the UK by women already living here or who are flown in and brought to “cutting parties” for a few girls at a time in a cost-saving exercise.

Then the girls will return to their schools and try to get on with their lives, scarred mentally and physically by female genital mutilation (FGM), a practice that serves as a social and cultural bonding exercise and, among those who are stitched up, to ensure that chastity can be proved to a future husband.

Even girls who suffer less extreme forms of FGM are unlikely to be promiscuous. One study among Egyptian women found 50% of women who had undergone FGM “endured” rather than enjoyed sex.

Cleanliness, neatness of appearance and the increased sexual pleasure for the man are all motivations for the practice. But the desire to conform to tradition is the most powerful motive. The rite of passage, condemned by many Islamic scholars, predates both the Koran and the Bible and possibly even Judaism, appearing in the 2nd century BC.

Although unable to give consent, many girls are compliant when they have the prodecure carried out, believing they will be outcasts if they are not cut. The mothers believe they are doing the best for their daughters. Few have any idea of the lifetime of hurt it can involve or the medical implications.

Jamelia, now 20, who says her whole personality changed afterwards.”I felt a lot older. It was odd because nobody says this is a secret, keep your mouth shut but that’s the message you get loud and clear.” She stopped the sports and swimming she used to love and became “strangely disconnected with her own body”. Other girls have died, of shock or blood loss; some have picked up infections from dirty tools. Jamelia’s mother paid extra for the woman to use a clean razor. It is thought that in the UK there are one or two doctors who can be bribed by the very rich to to carry out FGM using anaesthetic and sterilised instruments.

Comfort Momoh works at Guy’s and St Thomas’ Hospital in London, in one of the 16 clinics up and down the country who deal with FGM and its health repercusssions. Women who have had much of their external genitalia sliced off and their vaginas stitched closed, but for a tiny hole, also come to be cut open in order to give birth.

There are four types of female circumcision identified by the World Health Organisation, ranging from partial to total removal of the external female genitalia. Some 140 million women worldwide have been subjected to FGM and an estimated further two million are at risk every year. Most live in 28 African countries while others are in Yemen, Kurdistan, the US, Saudi Arabia, Australia and Canada. Continue Reading →

Barbara Kay: Action on Honour Killings.

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From The National Post

Barbara Kay: Action on honour killings

July 12, 2010 – 4:20 pm

Muhammad Shan Parvez and Waqas Parvez

Nathan Denette / National Post

Muhammad Shan Parvez, left, and Waqas Parvez — brothers of murderer teenager Aqsa Parvez — leave a Brampton, Ont., courthouse on Dec. 14, 2007.

The Minister for Status of Women, Rona Ambrose, gave a press conference today on “culturally-driven violence and so-called ‘honour crimes.’ ” The occasion prompting her remarks was the official release of a position paper on the growing problem of culturally driven violence in Canada’s immigrant communities by the Frontier Centre for Public Policy, the subject of my July 7th column.

The report, Culturally-Driven Violence Against Women: A growing problem in Canada’s immigrant communities, was written by Aruna Papp, a counsellor to immigrant men and women caught up in domestic conflicts. Ms Papp, an immigrant from India who herself suffered a great deal of culturally-related abuse, has emerged as an expert on South Asian cultural gender roles and honour/shame-related behaviours. Ms Papp has written about the subject of culturally-driven violence in the National Post.

Reflecting opinions expressed in the report, the minister endorsed Ms Papp’s most important points, emphasizing, with regard to honour killings, “These heinous acts cannot be justified by cultural relativism or excused under the guise of political correctness.” Continue Reading →

Iran’s grotesque abuse of human rights.

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From The Guardian U.K.

Iranians still facing death by stoning despite ‘reprieve’

Fifteen could still die in horrific sentence after being allegedly convicted of adultery

An Iranian woman at a protest in Brussels highlights the barbarity of death by stoning An Iranian woman at a protest in Brussels highlights the barbarity of death by stoning, in which women are buried up to their necks in front of a crowd of volunteers. Photograph: Thierry Roge/Reuters

Twelve Iranian women and three men are on death row awaiting execution by stoning despite an apparent last-minute reprieve for a mother of two who had been facing the horrific sentence after being convicted of adultery.

Human rights groups and activists welcomed a wave of international publicity and protests over the case of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, 43, who was awaiting execution in the western Iranian town of Tabriz after what her lawyer called an unjust trial and a sham conviction.

The Iranian embassy in London said in a statement that “according to information from the relevant judicial authorities” the stoning would not go ahead. If confirmed it would be an victory for a brief but intense campaign that was first highlighted by the Guardian last week.

However, there are still concerns over her plight. In a previous case a prisoner who was to be stoned was instead executed by hanging. Continue Reading →

Father, brother threaten Harry Potter star’s life over Hindu boyfriend

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Thanks to regular commenter OxAO for tipping us to this story.

Related: ‘Harry Potter’ Star in Family Feud Over Hindu Beau.

From The New York Post

Family of ‘Harry Potter’ actress charged with threatening to kill her over boyfriend

Muslim fury over beau

By ANDY SOLTIS

Last Updated: 6:37 AM, July 3, 2010

The strict Muslim father and brother of “Harry Potter” actress Afshan Azad have been charged with threatening to kill her because she has a boyfriend.

Azad, 22, fled the suburban English home she shared with her father, Abdul, 54, mother, Nilofar, and three brothers after the bizarre incident on May 21, authorities said.

A spokesman for prosecutors said her brother Ashraf, 28, physically attacked her and both he and their father threatened to kill her because of her relationship with an unidentified Hindu man.

They confronted her in her bedroom and left her “badly bruised” when she refused to stop seeing the man, the Daily Express said.

Afshan, who appeared in four Potter movies is believed to have taken refuge at the London home of friends.

Both of the accused men appeared in Manchester Magistrates’ Court and were ordered not to travel to London while the case was adjourned until July 12. Their bail conditions also required them to observe a curfew of 11 p.m. to 6 a.m. and not to contact an unnamed man, believed to be the boyfriend.

No other details of the incident were disclosed. But Ashraf told the Daily Telegraph that the family will suffer as a result of the scandal.

“We are going to get trouble from the community now,” he said. “It is bad news for our safety, her safety.”

“Her career could be ruined. When she goes to a premiere or something, they are going to ask her about this, not the film,” he added.

“My younger brother is going to get harassed at college,” Ashraf said. “All our family is going to be harassed by the community because of this.”

Afshan, who had never acted before, was a student in Manchester in 2005 when she auditioned as a “laugh” for the film “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.” She won the role of Padma Patil, one of Harry’s witch classmates and later his girlfriend.

She appeared again as Padma, the twin of Parvati Patil, who is played by 22-year-old Shefali Chodhury, in three more films and will appear in the final installment, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows,” next year.

The arrests were the latest misfortune for a Potter cast member. In 2008, Rob Knox, who played Marcus Belby in “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” was stabbed to death when he tried to break up a fight involving his 17-year-old brother.

Lashes and stonings abound in Iran as it slams Canada for human rights abuse

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From PressTV, DailyMail U.K.

Iran has described the arrests of protesters at the recent G20 summit in Toronto as an inhuman act and has warned against the ” new and dangerous” approach adopted by Canada toward the civil rights of it’s citizens. Meanwhile, the country with the highest execution rate in the world is set to stone a woman to death for adultery.

‘Help us save our mother’: Pleas from the children of ‘adulterous’ Iranian woman who faces death by stoning

By Michael Theodoulou
Last updated at 4:12 AM on 2nd July 2010

An Iranian woman faces death by stoning after being convicted of adultery.

Amnesty International yesterday called on the Iranian authorities to halt the imminent execution of mother-of-two Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani and the hanging of another woman said to be a political activist.

Ashtiani was convicted of having an ‘illicit relationship’ with two men in May 2006 and received 99 lashes as her sentence.
Despite this, she has also been convicted of adultery and sentenced to death by stoning.

The 43-year-old has retracted a ‘confession’ she said was made under duress.

Appealing for help to the international community, her daughter, Farideh, 16, and son, Sajad, 20, said yesterday: ‘Please help end this nightmare and do not let it turn into a reality. Help us save our mother.’

Under Iran’s Islamic penal code, adultery is punishable by stoning to death or flogging, while hanging is the penalty for murder and other crimes such as drug trafficking.

Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani faces death by stoning after being convicted of adultery Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani faces death by stoning after being convicted of adultery

Stoning sentences were widely carried out after Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, but have been rare in recent years.

Men killed in this way are buried to the waist, while women are buried deeper, to stop the stones hitting their breasts.

If a prisoner manages to pull free during a stoning, he or she is acquitted or jailed, but is not executed. It is easier for a man to drag himself free because he is not buried so deeply.

In December 2008 a man convicted of adultery escaped death by stoning by dragging himself out of the pit he had been buried in for the punishment.

But two other alleged male adulterers were killed by the barbaric method in the same incident, which took place in the north-eastern city of Mashhad.

Iranian activists against stoning say it is not prescribed in the Koran.

Iran has the highest execution rate in the world.

Amnesty International has recorded 126 executions between January and June – among them five political prisoners.

Toronto Islamic conference speakers known for ‘hate’ comments

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Kathryn Blaze Carlson, National Post

Toronto — A massive upcoming Islamic conference in Toronto, which was to be headlined by an Indian televangelist until he was recently banned from Canada for his inflammatory statements, features a list of speakers whose past comments against Jews, homosexuals and the West have raised red flags in other countries.

The Journey of Faith Conference — billed as North America’s largest Islamic conference and slated to attract upwards of 10,000 people to the city early next month — features such personalities as Abdur Raheem Green, who has advocated “fighting jihad” and who was reportedly invited by the Christmas Day airline bomber to address British students in 2007, and Sheikh Hussein Yee, who once said Jews are the “extremists of the world” and will “go to Hell.” Continue Reading →

Islamic Navigational System

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From The Daily Mail U.K.

Woman fined for erratic driving caused by niqab headscarf impairing her vision

By Mail Foreign Service
Last updated at 12:43 PM on 14th June 2010

Restricted: The niqab was 'bothering the driver in her manoeuvres' according to policeRestricted: The niqab was ‘bothering the driver in her manoeuvres’ according to police

A motorist has been fined for erratic driving caused by her Islamic headscarf, just weeks after a similar incident sparked a major political row.

Police in Vaucluse in southern France stopped the woman after she was spotted driving her vehicle carelessly on the road.

It was then officers noticed the driver was wearing a niqab, a veil that leaves only the eyes exposed, and that her sight was impaired, according to commanding officer Charles Bourillon.

‘[The headscarf] was bothering the driver in her manoeuvres … It was obvious she could not see a thing,’ he said.

Police gave the driver a ticket for 22 euros (£18) for driving with a reduced field of vision.

Officers then suggested that the woman remove her niqab to improve her sight, which she did.

The Islamic veil has become a political hot potato in France.

President Nicolas Sarkozy’s government is pushing ahead with a legal ban on wearing full-face veils such as the niqab or burqa in public, despite a warning from state judicial experts that such a law could be unconstitutional.

In April, a woman in the French city of Nantes was fined for wearing a veil while driving.

The incident spiralled after a minister threatened to punish her Muslim husband for offences including polygamy.

Saudi’s on MTV’s ‘True Life’ sued, face punishment for ‘openly declaring sin’

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From The National Post

I want my ‘openly declaring sin’ MTV!

Ali Jarekji/Reuters file photo

Ali Jarekji/Reuters file photo

By Katherine Laidlaw June 1, 2010 – 7:30 pm

Three Saudi youths (none pictured here) who will appear on an upcoming episode of MTV’s reality show True Life could face punishments including prison and lashing for their on-air discussion of wanting more freedoms in their homeland. One girl, Fatima, tried to open a business selling cloaks in colours other than black.

Three Saudi youth may face punishment for appearing on the MTV reality show True Life to talk about ways they’re resisting the country’s strict morality, after the Saudi religious police filed a lawsuit against them for the crime of “openly declaring sin.”

The police are trying to drag the three into court and, if successful, charge them. The teens starred in an episode of the MTV documentary series, which originally aired in Saudi Arabia on May 24, called “Resist the Power! Saudi Arabia.” The program followed three characters, identified only by their first names: Aziz, who tries to meet his girlfriend for a date; Fatima, who tries to open a business selling cloaks in colours other than black; and Ahmad, who thinks women should be able to run for and hold elected office.

On the show, Aziz says, “We are not free to live as we like,” and describes the difficulty he experiences when trying to go on dates in Jeddah with his girlfriend.

An officer at the Jeddah court said it would take at least a week to decide whether to proceed to trial.

The Saudi judiciary system, based on an austere reading of Islamic sharia law, metes out harsh punishments for morality offences, sometimes including lashes with a whip and years of imprisonment. Last year, a Saudi named Mazen Abdul-Jawad was sentenced to 1,000 lashes and five years in prison for discussing his sexual affairs on a show televised by the Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation.

“It will be very difficult to stop the religious clockwork once this gets to court,” a Saudi lawyer told Reuters yesterday. The True Life subjects “may face harsh sanctions like those dealt to Abdul-Jawad.”

–True Life “Resist the Power! Saudi Arabia” will air in Canada on July 12 at 3 p.m. ET on MTV2. Click here for more details. mtv.ca/tvshows/true-life for more information.

with files from Reuters

Acid attacker got 30 years

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NEWS.MSN.UK.COM

Mohammed Vakas has been jailed for 30 years for an acid attack that left his victim severely disfigured

Mohammed Vakas has been jailed for 30 years for an acid attack that left his victim severely disfigured

An acid attacker who left a 25-year-old man severely disfigured in a horrific plot to avenge his family’s “dishonour” has been jailed for 30 years.

Mohammed Vakas was found guilty by an Old Bailey jury of plotting to murder Awais Akram.

The victim was targeted because of his intimate relationship with Sadia Khatoon, 24, a married businesswoman he had met on Facebook, the court heard.

When her husband, Shakeel Abassi, and Vakas, her brother, found out about it, they got her to lure Mr Akram out of his flat to the scene of the attack.

There the victim was beaten and stabbed before Vakas poured concentrated sulphuric acid over his head, leaving him with 47% burns and fighting for his life.

Vakas, 26, of Walthamstow, was found guilty of conspiring with Khatoon and her husband to murder Mr Akram.

Fellow attackers Mohammed Adeel, 20, also of Walthamstow, and a 17-year-old youth, who can now be named as Fabion Kuci, of Harlesden, north-west London, were convicted of conspiracy to cause grievous bodily harm.

Adeel was jailed for 14 years and the youth was locked up for eight years. Continue Reading →