By pandering to ethnic nationalism, the Parti Québécois is playing a cynical and dangerous game, Martin Patriquin argues.
Category Archives: State Oppression
Russian Muslim leaders protest over ban on translation of Qur’an
Russia’s senior Islamic clerics warned the country’s leaders on Friday unrest could erupt in Muslim communities in Russia and beyond if a court decision ordering the destruction of a interpretive translation of Koran is not overturned.
Tuesday’s ruling by a court in Novorossiysk, a city in southern Russia, ordered the widely read text outlawed under a Russian anti-extremism law that rights activists say has been abused by local officials out of prejudice or to persecute groups frowned upon by the dominant Russian Orthodox Church. Rights campaigners said that the decision, which will apply nationwide unless it is overturned on appeal, comes dangerously close to banning the Koran itself.
Russia’s Council of Muftis sounded the alarm in an open letter on Friday to President Vladimir Putin, who has frequently called for unity among the leading faiths and warned that ethnic tension could tear Russia apart.
“Russian Muslims are very strongly indignant over such an outrageous decision,” Rushan Abbyasov, the deputy head of the council, which has close ties with the Kremlin, told Reuters. If the ruling is acted on, the cleric warned: “There will be unrest … not only in Russia but all over the world, we are talking about the destruction of the Koran.”
In the letter to Putin, the council drew a parallel with violence in the Middle East and Afghanistan over the actions of an American pastor, Terry Jones, who threatened to burn the Koran on September 11, 2010. “Is it necessary to discuss how the destruction of books, especially sacred religious books, has been received in Russia in the past?” it said.
“We recall how the burning of just a few copies of the Holy Koran by a crazy American pastor elicited a firm protest not just from Russian Muslims but from our entire society, in solidarity with the stormy and longlasting anger of the global Muslim community and all people of goodwill,” it said.
UKIP no longer proposes ‘burqa ban’ law
UKIP deputy leader Paul Nuttall has stated that his party no longer proposes a state ban on the Muslim veil in some public places.
Nuttall told the Huffington Post yesterday that “our view is pretty much that if people need to see your face, then quite frankly it should be shown” – for example in a bank – but that the party would not bring in legislation to impose a ban, because they are “libertarians”.
Not so long ago, of course, UKIP did propose to legislate for such a ban. In its manifesto for the May 2010 general election the party pledged to “tackle extremist Islam by banning the burqa or veiled niqab in public buildings and certain private buildings”.
As Nuttall points out, that was under a different leader – namely Lord Pearson, who had close connections with the likes of Pamela Geller, the US Islamophobe who was recently banned from entering the UK because of her record of anti-Muslim hatemongering.
Woman says she was accosted in mall over her Islamic veil as Liberals threaten election over Quebec charter
Saturday’s demonstration in Montreal against the so-called ‘Charter of Values’
The leader of the Quebec Liberals appears prepared to do everything he can to stop the Parti Quebecois government’s proposed charter of values – including fight an election over the issue. Philippe Couillard says he’s against any law that leads to employment discrimination and that Muslim women who wear a veil will always be welcome in his own party.
The PQ plan will become law “over my dead body,” Couillard said Sunday at a party meeting on women’s issues in Montreal. “The big mistake that the government is making is to make people believe that, in order to defend what is specific about Quebec, we must trample on other people’s rights.”
The PQ wants to forbid public employees from wearing religious headwear, including the veil, as part of a proposed charter announced last Tuesday.
Couillard’s remarks came after a Quebec woman of Algerian origin wearing an Islamic veil said she and her son were accosted at Place Laurier shopping centre in Quebec City two weeks ago by a woman citing the charter who demanded they change their religion and remove the headscarf.
Police face court over refusal to hand over reports on anti-Muslim ‘bias’
Scotland Yard is facing court action next week after refusing to hand over the results of investigations it was ordered to conduct into claims that it used counter-terrorism powers to discriminate against and harass innocent Muslims.
The Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) is seeking a high court order against the refusal, which it says amounts to a clear breach of the law.
The IPCC ordered the investigations following complaints from Muslim Britons alleging police discrimination in the use of schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act, 2000, which allows stops at airports and ports, even if wrongdoing is not suspected.
Montreal Muslims protest against Quebec Charter of Values
Montreal Demonstration against Quebec Charter of Values
Montreal, Quebec, September 12th, 2013 — The Muslim Council of Montreal (MCM) invites all Montrealers of conscience to join a peaceful demonstration this weekend against the Quebec Charter of Values recently unveiled by the Parti Quebecois government.
NYC claims Muslim surveillance warranted
The New York Police Department had legitimate reasons to put specific mosques and Muslim worshippers under surveillance as part of its counterterrorism efforts, a city lawyer said Thursday at the first court date in a civil rights lawsuit accusing the NYPD of religious profiling.
Peter Farrell of the city Law Department argued that before the case goes forward, the city should be allowed to present evidence specific to the six plaintiffs that he said would prove police were acting with legitimate law enforcement purposes. If the judge agrees, “then this case is over,” he said.
An American Civil Liberties Union attorney, Hina Shamsi, countered that her clients already had sufficient legal standing to sue the city and that the NYPD should be ordered to begin turning over sensitive reports and documents detailing the alleged spying on Muslims.
U.S. Magistrate Joan Azrack said she would rule at a later date.
Ad aims to lure Quebec doctors to Ontario, targeting values charter
An Ontario hospital is trying to lure Quebec-trained health care workers by tapping into the controversy surrounding Quebec’s values charter.
Lakeridge Health is planning to run the ad, which features a woman wearing a headscarf, in a McGill University student newspaper. The ad says: “We don’t care what’s on your head. We care what’s in it.”
“We thought, given the controversy that’s going on in Quebec … maybe this would be an opportunity to create some awareness of what Lakeridge Health is,” said Kevin Empey, chief executive of the Oshawa-based hospital.
Quebec: Values charter is ‘conspicuously’ not about secularism
Writing in the Montreal Gazette, Don Macpherson carries out a thorough demolition of the Parti Québécois government’s proposed “Charter of Quebec Values”.
Alan Sked defends multiculturalism, opposes veil ban, accuses UKIP of ‘dog whistle policy to racists’
Amanda Kelly of Global News has interviewed Alan Sked, the founder and former leader of UKIP, to get his perspective on Quebec’s Charter of Values.