Qadianis Act review not to be allowed: JI

	Friday, June 18, 2010, Rajab 5 ,1431 A.H.
Qadianis Act review not to be allowed: JI

Friday, June 18, 2010
By our correspondent

LAHORE

JAMAAT-e-Islami Secretary General Liaquat Baloch has expressed concern over Qadianis’ efforts for review of the anti-Qadianis Act and warned that Muslim masses would foil all attempts in this regard.

He was commenting on the reports of Pakistani High Commissioner to UK Wajid Shamsul Hasan’s meeting with head of Qadyani Jamaat and latter’s petition to President Zardari for a review of the anti-Qadianis law.

Baloch said the presidency, foreign office and the Pakistani high commissioner in London had hurt the sentiments of Muslim masses and put to question their own loyalty to the constitution of Pakistan.

Liaquat Baloch pointed out that the National Assembly had declared Qadianis non-Muslims after detailed hearing of their arguments and they enjoyed full minority rights in this country. However, he said, for some time, under the pressure of colonial powers, the official circles were in touch with the Qadianis for allowing the community to openly perform its activities.

He said there had been repeated statement from the US on this issue.

Stating that the Khatm-e-Nubuwwat was an issue of life and death for the Muslims, Baloch said Pakistani nation would never permit a review of the anti Qadianis law. He said that the recent attack on the Qadianis worship places in the Punjab capital was planned by the anti-Islam forces in order to project the community as a victim and to pressurise the government in its favour.

METTING: The Jamaat-e-Islami central executive will meet on Friday (today) at Mansoorah with JI Chief Syed Munawar Hasan in the chair while a three- day meeting of the Jamaat’s Central Shoora will begin here on Saturday, June 19.

Killings condemned: The Jamaat-e-Islami leadership has condemned the assassination of the party leader from Hangu, Maulana Fida Muhammad Sa’di, along with his colleague and termed it terrorism and height of lawlessness. In a statement on Thursday, JI Ameer Syed Munawar Hasan, former Ameer Qazi Husain Ahmed and Secretary General Liaquat Baloch demanded immediate arrest of the killers and deterrent punishment to them.

URL: http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=245650

‘Attack on Ahmedis conspiracy to repeal laws against them’

PAKISTAN

‘Attack on Ahmedis conspiracy to repeal laws against them’

Wednesday, 09 Jun, 2010

People from Ahmadi community prepare to bury a casket containing a victim of an attack by militants, at their graveyard in Rabwah, some 150 kilometres northwest from Lahore, May 29, 2010. — AP

LAHORE: A gathering of the leaders of 13 religious and political parties in Lahore claimed that the attack on Ahmedis on May 28 was part of a conspiracy to repeal the laws against them, BBCUrdu reported.

The meeting was held in an office of the Majlis Ahrar Islam in Lahore’s Muslim Town. The parties concluded that a conspiracy was in place to debate the laws against Ahmedis, the report said.

Maulana Zahidul Rashdi, who is a founding member of the Muttahida Tehrik-i-Khatm-i-Nabuwat and also the Secretary-General of the Pakistan Shariat Council, read the joint statement at the meeting’s conclusion: The attack on Ahmedis is being used as an excuse to generate suspicions regarding the concept of khatm-i-nabuwat.

The gathering was attended by leaders of the Jamaat-i-Islami, Jamiat-i-ulema-i-Islam Fazlur Rahman group, Jamaatud Dawa and Markazi Jamaat-i-Ahl-i-Sunnat among others.

During the meeting, Maulana Ilyas Chinioti, a member of the PML-N and the Punjab provincial assembly, condemned Nawaz Sharif’s statement in which he had sympathised with the Ahmedis and called them his brothers.

The meeting’s participants demanded that Nawaz Sharif immediately withdraw his statement.

©2010 DAWN Media Group. All rights reserved

URL: www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-libr...us-groups-qs-08

Islamic veil unfolding over Indonesia

---The Malaysian Insider, Malaysia

Tuesday September 22 2009

Islamic veil unfolding over Indonesia

JAKARTA, Sept 22 — Recent moves in Indonesia, including plans by one province to stone adulterers to death, have raised concerns about the reputation of the world’s most populous Muslin country as a beacon of moderate Islam.

The provincial assembly in the western-most province of Aceh — at the epicentre of the Indian Ocean tsunami that killed 170,000 people there nearly five years ago — last week decreed the ancient Islamic penalty of stoning to death for adultery.

The decision could still be overturned once Aceh’s new Parliament is sworn in next month.

But many, including Aceh’s governor, the central government in Jakarta, and local businessmen, are concerned about the impact a broadcast public execution by stoning could have on Indonesia’s international reputation.

“The perception and the reaction from the international community would be condemnation,” said Anton Gunawan, chief economist at Bank Danamon, who stressed that he thought an actual stoning unlikely.

“For investors who are relatively familiar with Indonesia and know it is mostly moderate, it might not have an impact. But for people who don’t know Indonesia, they will think ‘Oh, now I have to be careful of it’.”

The Aceh case is one of several showing how hardline Muslim groups are influencing policy in Indonesia.

Local governments, given wide latitude to enact laws under Indonesia’s decentralisation programme, have begun to mandate Syariah regulations, including dress codes for women.

One ethnic Chinese Indonesian businessman, a practising Christian who asked not to be quoted by name, said that he feared if the trend continued it could lead to capital flight by the wealthy Chinese, Christian minority.

“A lot of regional laws are going in that direction. It’s already alarming the way it’s going. It’s a minority who are doing this, but the problem is that the silent majority just keep silent.”

Last year, the government imposed restrictions on Ahmadiyya, a minority Muslim cult, following intense lobbying by hardline Muslim groups to have them banned.

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s party also backed an anti-pornography law, which imposes restrictions on certain forms of dance, traditional dress and the depiction of nudity in art.

The law was widely condemned by minority religious and ethnic groups, including the Balinese.

A new film law passed this month goes even further, prohibiting depictions of drug use, gambling and pornography, and requiring film-makers to have their plots approved by the Minister of Culture before production can begin.

“I think the Islamic parties will be a strong influence on the lawmaking of the next cabinet,” said Suma Mihardja, who led a campaign against the anti-pornography law.

“Tension could be directed toward xenophobia, racism, or religious conflict as we see in Malaysia today.”

Other legislation on the cards at the national level includes a bill making halal certification compulsory, instead of voluntary as is now the case.

That would result in higher costs for many food and pharmaceuticals companies, domestic and foreign, ranging from Nestle and Unilever to Kraft Foods Inc and Cadbury Plc, said Suroso Natakusuma from the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

“Every single item will need halal certification and an external audit process may follow,” he said.

“The auditor may need to be sent to the country where the product was made to check the process is halal. That means air tickets, hotels. This will mean a lot of extra costs.”

The religiously inspired laws seem to run against the wishes of the electorate.

In the 2009 parliamentary election, the vote for the conservative Islamic party PPP declined 2.8 percentage points to just 5 per cent of the total vote, while the vote for another Islamic group, the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS), rose only 1.5 percentage points to 9 percent of the total. Overall, the share of votes for Islamic parties has steadily declined.

“People appear to be pandering to an audience that isn’t really asking for anything,” said James Bryson of HB Capital, which invests in Indonesian stocks. “The halal bill is not winning any votes and it’s making an already complex system of certification even more expensive.”

“Many of these laws lately are becoming more conservative,” said Said Abdullah of secular opposition party PDI-P who is on the committee debating the halal bill. “The government is trying to accommodate the Muslim community but they are actually not following our real constitution.”

Yudhoyono, a former general, won a second five-year term in July on promises to continue the battle against corruption and spur economic growth.

In the run-up to elections, Yudhoyono and his secular Democrat Party shifted closer to a clutch of religious parties including the hardline Islamist PKS, as relations with his main coalition partner, Golkar, grew increasingly strained.

Aceh wants to attract more investment, just like many other parts of Indonesia. Holding public executions by stoning, which could be televised and shown around the world, could well make that more difficult. — Reuters

URL: www.themalaysianinsider.com/index.php/bus...unfolding-over-indonesia