Four years after cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings of Allah be with him) set off violent protests across the Muslim world, Islamic nations are mounting a campaign for an international treaty to protect religious symbols and beliefs from mockery - essentially a ban on blasphemy that would put them on a collision course with free speech laws in the West. It is reported that Algeria and Pakistan have taken the lead in lobbying to bring the proposal to a vote in the UN Gener...

Romania’s two biggest Muslim organisations, Taiba Foundation and Ifta’ House, and have joined hands for the first time to co-organise the annual Hajj journey, a move seen as an important step towards uniting Muslim organisations in the eastern European country. The joint organisation of the Hajj by Romania’s two biggest Muslim organisations is seen as an important step towards uniting Muslim organisations in the eastern European country. The importance of this step is that...

The Swiss through a referendum imposed a national ban on the construction of minarets. The referendum, which passed with a clear majority of 57.5 per cent of the voters and in 22 of Switzerland’s 26 cantons, was a victory for the right. As the ban gained a majority of votes and passed in a majority of the cantons, it will be added to the Constitution. The rightist Swiss People’s Party, or SVP, and a small religious party had proposed inserting a single sentence banning th...

Malaysia will step up the promotion of Muslim tour packages, including Ramadan attractions, for the Chinese market, said Tourism Minister Datuk Seri Dr Ng Yen Yen. “The number of Chinese Muslim tourists to Malaysia in year 2003 was 50,000 and the figure has gone up to 94,000 people last year. With the high volume of Chinese tourists, I believe that promoting Islamic tourism among Chinese Muslims has great potential,” she said at a dialogue with Muslim leaders and tour operators ...

The Cleveland chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-Cleveland) hosted its first annual Building Muslim Youth Leadership Conference.  The conference attracted over 170 attendees from as far away as Toledo, Pittsburgh, Youngtown and Columbus as well as members of the local Cleveland area Muslim community. The Conference, entitled “Fortifying Knowledge & Worship: Building Muslim Youth Leadership,” included lectures and workshops on media, civil rights,...

The Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front have invited Japan, Turkey, the United Kingdom and Saudi Arabia to form part of the International Contact Group (ICG) that will guarantee all agreements in the peace process of the two negotiating parties. The Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) said of the four states that have been officially invited to join the ICG, only the UK, Japan and Turkey have showed positive signs that they are interested. Saudi Arabia, the MILF sai...

Germany plans to have immigrants sign “integration contracts” that would oblige foreigners seeking to live in the country to avow certain values, such as freedom of speech and equal rights for women. German Integration Commissioner Maria Boehmer has said that she wants to move on plans to have new immigrants sign a contract with the state. Such a move, she argues, would make integration efforts more binding. Boehmer said the contracts would explain what services and assistance w...

Britain’s former ambassador to the UN, who was at the centre of failed attempts to obtain a Security Council mandate for the 2003 invasion of Iraq, admitted that the legitimacy of the war was “questionable.” Speaking on the fourth day of the Iraq inquiry, Greenstock said that he believed the US and UK had “established” legality for the war in that it had never been challenged at the UN or the International Court of Justice. “I regarded our participation i...

Iraqi lawmakers approved an amended version of the election law that would govern the country’s national elections slated for January. The lawmakers changed the system for distributing seats, forcing the Sunni lawmakers to walk out before the vote on the amendments. During the past few days, the parliamentary political blocs were holding intense talks in a bid to agree on the bill that was vetoed by Hashimi, who demanded more seats for Iraqis living abroad. The amended bill still has ...

NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen called on European countries to send additional soldiers to Afghanistan. “It is of utmost importance that an American announcement of increased troop numbers is followed by additional troop contributions from other allies,” Rasmussen said at a joint press briefing with German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin. American President Barack Obama is expected to announce an additional 30,000 US troops for Afghanistan next week. &ldquo...

Some 2,000 people turned out for the 13th annual banquet of the Greater Los Angeles Area chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-LA). The event helped raise $432,000 to support CAIR-LA’s civil rights and advocacy efforts. This year’s banquet was moderated by CAIR-LA Deputy Executive Director Ameena Mirza Qazi and former CAIR-LA Government Relations Director Omar Zaki. Opening remarks at the banquet were delivered by California Assemblyman Ted Lieu (D-Torrance)...