Opposition MPs of the Netherlands submitted draft legislation to the Council of State advisory body to repeal the ban on blasphemy. The ruling Labour party has already said it supports the change in the law, giving the proposal majority support in parliament. Earlier this year justice minister Ernst Hirsch Ballin agreed to suspend the blasphemy laws and amend the discrimination legislation (Article 137c) to make it a criminal offence to insult groups of people instead. That plan followed a ...

The average per capita monthly expenditure of nine million Afghans is less than 66 US cents a day, and millions of other Afghans spend about $42 a month, according to a summary of Afghanistan’s new National Risk and Vulnerability Assessment (NRVA). NRVA 2007/08 was produced by the government with European Union funding and in collaboration with aid agencies. The literacy rate is 26 per cent (12 per cent female and 39 male).  24 per cent of all child deliveries are attended by a s...

The Western media and establishment are raising the question whether Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is giving up on the West. The Turkish prime minister adopted a tougher stance on Israel recently. The AOS incident is fresh in the Western memory. Further similar situation has emerged as a result Israel’s removal from a NATO drill in the Central Anatolian province of Konya by the Turkish government. The United States retaliated and withdrew from it too. Turkey, as a NATO m...

Almost one in five Swedes aged under 30 think that George W Bush’s US government lay behind the attacks on September 11th 2001, according to a new survey by Novus Opinion. The Novus poll indicates that a significant number of young Swedes are persuaded by the logic of the argument. Of the 1,000 Swedes surveyed in an internet panel, 70 per cent responded that al-Qaida were behind the attacks, while 7 per cent did not think so. Among those under-30 only 58 per cent believed responsibili...

Muslim women would be banned from wearing tight pants in a devoutly Islamic district of Indonesia’s Aceh province under proposed regulations to take effect January 1. It is the latest effort to promote strict moral values in the world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation. Any Muslim caught violating the dress code, which also prohibits shorts for men, will be told to put on government-issued full-length skirts or loose pants, said Ramli Mansur, head of West Aceh District. &ldq...

While Malaysia is doing a great job in promoting Islamic finance, the adaptation process to some of its products will need a deeper look or “a second visit”, according to a renowned Muslim scholar. Dr Hatem El-Karanshawy, founding dean of the Qatar Faculty of Islamic Studies, has voiced caution over the need to quickly Islamise products just to be at par with other conventional instruments.

“We should not rush to adopt products and Islamise them in a way becau...

The Saudi Armed Forces are in “complete control” of the Mount Dokhan region and have “purged the mountains inside the Kingdom” of the Yemeni guerrillas, said Prince Khaled Bin Sultan Bin Abdul Aziz, Assistant Minister of Defense and Aviationin a statement carried by the Saudi Press Agency (SPA). All previously captured mountaintops inside Saudi territory following the armed infiltration of the Huthi rebels are now cleared, he said.  “The order of the Custo...

Senior Iranian lawmakers rejected any possibility of Tehran shipping uranium abroad for further enrichment, intensifying pressures on the government to reject the UN-backed plan altogether. Prominent lawmaker Alaeddin Boroujerdi said Iran won’t ship its low-enriched uranium abroad in a single batch or in several shipments, a compromise suggested by some government officials, under any circumstances. “Nothing will be given of the 1,200 kilograms (of low-enriched uranium) ... to t...

Sheikh Ahmad bin Ibrahim Badr, the chief artist who recast the golden door of the Ka’bah, has died at the age of 89 in Makkah. Ahmad made the Ka’bah’s door using 300 kg of pure gold at the orders of King Khaled in October 1979. The work was carried out at a workshop prepared exclusively for the project. He also refurbished the meezab (the spout at the top of Kaaba) and the Black Stone’s silver frame. He learned his art from his father Sheikh Ibrahim Badr who ori...