Al-Sudais says ignorant murderers harming Islam

Al-Sudais says ignorant murderers harming Islam

Sheikh Abdulrahman Al-Sudais, head of the Presidency of the Two Holy Mosques, said Islam needs understanding and in-depth comprehension at a time when some Muslims are ignorant of the facts of Islam.

Al-Sudais was delivering a lecture at the Islamic Cultural Center in Britain.

He said Muslims need to understand the basics of the faith, as well as moderation and consideration for the contemporary application of its tenets. All these should contribute to the correct understanding of Islam.

“The Muslim, through his presence in life should achieve the worship of God Almighty in accordance with the correct ideology and he needs to join in the efforts of other humans and not sow disagreement and discord,” Al-Sudais told the audience, which included scientists, intellectuals and thinkers.

He lamented the demonization of Islam today by groups that do not know the facts about this sacred religion and its purposes, and have taken to violence as a way to express this ignorance, and have sought to shed the blood of innocents by bombings and killings.

“This puts a great responsibility on the Muslim people, its leaders and officials and scholars, as well as the heads of Islamic centers to explain to the world the facts of Islam and how they contradict such irregular behavior and bloodshed. Extremism exists in all societies because of the behavior of a limited number of its members and the remaining members cannot take the blame for the mistakes of a few,” he added.

He called on all Muslims to project the bright image of Islam and to associate this with the good representation of Islamic communities and to be ambassadors for the tolerant values and principles of Islam. —via Arab News

Turkey tensions spill onto German streets

The failed coup against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has stoked tensions in Germany’s three-million-strong Turkish community, prompting demonstrations and threats that have put the authorities on edge.

After days of purges amid a crackdown on suspects and Erdogan’s rivals in Turkey, German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere issued a stern warning to partisans among the world’s largest Turkish diaspora.

“We don’t want these kinds of conflicts to play out in Germany with violence in the streets,” he told ZDF public television.

However supporters and opponents of Erdogan in Germany have vented their anger in the wake of a turbulent week in Turkey which saw an attempted coup crushed and Ankara detaining or sacking tens of thousands of people.

Turkish authorities imposed a state of emergency, strengthening state powers to round up suspects and suspending a key European rights convention, prompting serious concerns in the EU about the rule of law.

Those worries have been compounded in Germany by security fears, as tensions between backers of Erdogan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and his Islamic preacher Fethullah Gulen, whom Ankara blames for the coup, threaten to boil over.

‘Down with traitors’
The BDK federation representing 15,000 police officers cautioned there was a “very, very large” potential for the situation to explode.

“All Erdogan has to do is snap his fingers to get people to confront each other in the streets in a very emotional way,” its vice president Sebastian Fiedler told ZDF.

In the days after the uprising, Turks in Germany received appeals on social media to denounce suspected Gulen supporters, including a hotline number to call at the Turkish president’s offices, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reported.

In the western city of Gelsenkirchen on Wednesday, 150 people loyal to Erdogan stormed a cafe popular with Gulen backers, breaking a window and scuffling with patrons.

And mosques with links to the Turkish government hung placards reading “Down with traitors to the fatherland”.

During the night of the attempted coup, about 3,000 people massed in front of the Turkish embassy in Berlin, waving Turkish flags and holding aloft pictures of Erdogan.

Local media reports said members of a Turkish far-right organisation, the “Grey Wolves”, and other nationalist groups joined the rally as more than 200 police officers kept the peace.

A second pro-Erdogan demonstration in the German capital went off without incident on Saturday while a third, expected to draw 15,000 people, will be held in the western city of Cologne at the end of the month, police said.

Nearly all of Germany’s Turks are descendants of a “guest worker” programme launched in the 1960s to bring manpower to then West Germany.

Taunts and slurs
Meanwhile, however, hatred between the two sides has exploded on social media.

“All those who criticise Erdogan are immediately considered supporters of Gulen or the PKK [the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party],” said a leader of the opposition Greens party, Cem Ozdemir, himself the son of a Turkish guest worker.

“Erdogan may be able to do what he wants in Turkey, and that’s bad enough, but he can’t do it in Germany.”

A member of the Berlin state legislature, Erol Ozkaraca, a vocal Erdogan critic, said he had been subject to taunts and slurs.

“Liar, traitor, Gulen supporter — it’s all a lot of rubbish,” the Social Democrat told AFP.

Ercan Karakoyun, the head of the Foundation for Dialogue and Education, an organisation with close links to Gulen, has faced even more fervent abuse.

“It is threatening to see how there has been a campaign against the Gulen movement in Germany too conducted with rumours and conspiracy theories,” he told the Stuttgarter Zeitung.

Erdogan enjoys strong support among the 1.55 million Turkish citizens living in Germany. During the Turkish election last November, his AKP garnered around 60 per cent of the vote, an even stronger share than in Turkey.

And although many were born in Germany or lived here for decades, many ethnic Turks say they feel more engaged with political life in Turkey.

“With his propaganda and media presence, [Erdogan] creates the impression that he has made Turkey strong,” Ozkaraca said.

“They [Turkish immigrants] don’t have a sense of belonging to German society. We have not managed to integrate here, which leads people to identify with their country of origin.” Erdogan has recognised the importance of his base in Germany and even held stadium-sized campaign rallies in recent years in cities such as Berlin and Duesseldorf.

80 dead, 231 wounded as twin blasts strike Hazara demonstration in Kabul

Two powerful explosions on Saturday ripped through crowds of minority Hazaras in Kabul who had gathered to protest over a power line, killing at least 80 people and leaving 231 others wounded, Afghan public health ministry said.

Islamic State group claimed responsibility for twin explosions. The bombings, apparently aimed at sowing sectarian discord in a country well known for Shia-Sunni harmony, came as thousands of Hazaras gathered to protest over a multi-million-dollar power line.

“As a result of the attack 80 people were martyred and 231 others were wounded,” the interior ministry said in a statement.

“Based on initial information, the attack was carried out by three suicide bombers... The third attacker was gunned down by security forces.”

The Taliban, who are in the middle of their annual summer offensive and are more powerful than IS, strongly denied any involvement in the attack.

IS claimed the bombings in a statement carried by its affiliated Amaq news agency, calling it an attack on Shias.

One of the march organisers Laila Mohammadi said she arrived at the scene soon after the blast and saw “many dead and wounded people”.

'Horrific attack'

The attack came as thousands of demonstrators gathered to demand that a multi-million-dollar power line pass through their electricity-starved province of Bamiyan, one of the most deprived areas of Afghanistan with a large Hazara population.

“The horrific attack on a group of peaceful protestors in Kabul demonstrates the utter disregard that armed groups have for human life,” Amnesty International said in a statement.

Footage on Afghan television and photographs posted on social media showed a scene of carnage, with numerous bodies and body parts spread across the square.

Seddq Sediqqi, spokesman for the Ministry of Interior, said police were working to confirm initial reports of the blast.

Violence had been feared at what was the second demonstration by Hazaras over the power line issue. The last one in May attracted tens of thousands of people, also shutting down the central business district.

“Such attacks are a reminder that the conflict in Afghanistan is not winding down, as some believe, but escalating, with consequences for the human rights situation in the country that should alarm us all.”

In a statement, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani said he was “deeply saddened” by the carnage, adding that the casualties included security officials.

“Holding protests is the right of every citizen of Afghanistan... but terrorists entered the protests, and carried out explosions that martyred and wounded a number of citizens including members of security forces,” the presidential palace said.

It was attended by Hazara political leaders, who were notable by their absence on Saturday. At the height of the march, demonstrators chanted slogans against President Ashraf Ghani and Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah, shouted “death to discrimination” and “all Afghans are equal”.

The so-called TUTAP line is backed by the Asian Development Bank with involvement of Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan. The original plan routed the line through Bamiyan province, in the central highlands, where most of the country's Hazaras live.

That route was changed in 2013 by the previous Afghan government. Leaders of the marches have said that the rerouting was evidence of bias against the Hazara community, which accounts for up to 15 per cent of Afghanistan's estimated 30 million-strong population.

They are considered the poorest of the country's ethnic groups, and often complain of discrimination. Bamiyan is poverty stricken, though it is largely peaceful and has potential as a tourist destination.

Afghanistan is desperately short of power, with less than 40 per cent of the population connected to the national grid, according to the World Bank. Almost 75 per cent of electricity is imported.

Israeli man turns to Palestinian Authority for political asylum

An Israeli man has asked for political asylum in the West Bank areas administered by the Palestinian Authority (PA) after turning himself over to security forces.
The Palestinian Ma’an News Agency reported that Andre Beniron surrendered himself to Palestinian security guards in the West Bank city of Tulkarem on Monday.

According to the report, Beniron, 23, sought temporary political asylum and protection while trying to find a way to leave Israel.

Beniron told Ma’an that he had immigrated to Israel from Russia 20 years ago and lived with his mother in Haifa. He also complained about his difficult financial conditions while living in Israel.

Bail denied for baby killer

FORMER elite water polo player Keli Lane, who was convicted of murdering her newborn baby Tegan, has had an application for bail refused in a Sydney court.Lane made the application in the NSW Supreme Court today pending an appeal against her conviction, which saw her sentenced in April 2011 to at least 13 years and five months in jail for the murder of her two-day-old daughter in September 1996.
Appearing via audio-visual link in prison greens, Lane bowed her head as Justice Clifton Hoeben announced he was refusing bail.
Lane, whose now dark hair was severely pulled back in a low bun, was supported in court by her parents Sandra and Robert Lane and her boyfriend Patrick Cogan.The 37-year-old former water polo champion has continued to maintain she handed Tegan over to the infant’s father, a man with whom she said she had a brief affair.Lane had two terminations as a teenager and had kept three pregnancies and births secret from family and friends.She had adopted out her first and third babies but no trace of Tegan has been found since she left a Sydney hospital with Lane.The crown contended Lane murdered Tegan because a child would have interfered with her sporting, sex and social life.

In making the brief bail application, Lane’s barrister, Winston Terracini QC, said he was relying on two of their grounds of appeal.

The first was that the trial judge failed to leave an alternative count of manslaughter open to the jury, while the other was the “conduct of the prosecution”.

Mr Terracini said there was no evidence in the Lane case “of infliction of any harm with any intent”.

He said there was also a problem with crown prosecutor Mark Tedeschi’s method of questioning during the trial, which he submitted reversed the onus of proof.

He likened this method to that used by Mr Tedeschi during the trial of Gordon Wood, whose conviction for the murder of 24-year-old model Caroline Byrne was overturned last year by the Court of Criminal Appeal.

“It’s not as bad as Wood but it’s pretty bad,” Mr Terracini said.

Justice Hoeben said while he understood the points raised by Lane’s defence, they were an issue for the appeal court, not for a bail application.

Following an appearance at the appeal court last month, Lane’s solicitor Ben Archbold told reporters that her bail application would be a “good test” of the strength of her appeal and whether or not it would be successful.He said while Lane was “obviously disappointed” they were “still positive in respect to her appeal”.Lane was sentenced to a maximum of 18 years, with her earliest date for release set for May 2023.
In a directions hearing less than an hour before Lane’s bail application at the Supreme Court, her defence was ordered to serve further submissions on her appeal by March 13.

Thai PM charged with murder

Abhisit Vejjajiva, the former PM of Thailand, has been charged with murder over the death of a civilian during a crackdown on anti-government rallies two years ago, his party says.

Abhisit, along with then-deputy Suthep Thaugsuban, was formally charged at Bangkok’s Department of Special Investigation (DSI) on Thursday.

They are the first officials to face a court over Thailand’s worst political violence in decades.

“The DSI has charged Abhisit and Suthep on section 288, which is murder. They both denied the charge,” Thavorn Senniem, a senior Democrat Party lawmaker, told AFP.

Hundreds of riot police were deployed to guard the building, as about 20 supporters carrying roses and dozens of protesters holding pictures of those killed during the crisis watched the former leader arrive.

At least 90 people were killed and nearly 1,900 wounded in a series of street clashes between “Red Shirt” protesters and security forces. The crisis culminated in a deadly army operation in 2010 to break up the demonstrations.

The charge against Abhisit, who was prime minister at the time, relates to the fatal shooting of taxi driver Phan Kamkong.

Tarit Pengdith, the chief of the DSI, announced the move last Thursday, saying that it was prompted by a court ruling in September that Phan was shot by troops. That ruling was the first completed inquest into the 2010 bloodshed.

Abhisit dismissed the case against him as “political” and said his government had no choice but to take tough action. The rallies drew around 100,000 people at their height.

‘Red Shirt’ trial
Meanwhile, a separate terrorism case against 24 leaders of the Red Shirts, including five current legislators, for their part in the rallies was postponed after two witnesses failed to attend.

“The court has postponed the hearing until [Friday],” a judge said, adding the court will issue an arrest warrant for one of the accused, deputy commerce minister Nattawut Saikur, if he is not present then.

Nattawut had said he would miss Thursday’s court date because he had to accompany Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra on an official visit.

The trial against the Red Shirt leaders, who pleaded not guilty in August 2010, has been repeatedly postponed.

The Red Shirts – mostly supporters of ousted prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra – were demanding immediate elections in their 2010 protest.

They accused Abhisit’s government of being undemocratic because it took office in 2008 through a parliamentary vote after a court stripped Thaksin’s allies of power.

Elections in 2011 saw Thaksin’s Puea Thai party come back to power, with his sister Yingluck taking the prime minister’s post.

FIFA doctors ask for design changes to Muslim Girls head scarf

Medical advisers FIFA  are opposing the current design of a headscarf for Muslim Girls players.

Chairman of FIFA medical Michel D’Hooghe says samples received from two designers “represented a danger” to girls players’ health and a group of doctors tested the scarves and believes that wearing them while playing football could lead to head and neck injuries.

However, the panel on Thursday asked for further medical advice before it meets July 2.