Gina Khan on Sharia Courts

Long-time followers of my blog will recall that I have occasionally written about Gina Khan in my posts, going so far as to incorporate an extensive interview she had done in the media into a series that I did.

Well, I have also been in touch with this remarkable lady via e-mail. It is my impression that many people have sent her e-mails, and that the bulk of them have been very supportive. To be sure, I understand that, for taking a stand against militancy and extremism in the Islamic world, Gina, a Muslim, has also received her share of death threats from extremists.

Last year, I had hoped Gina would do an interview for me to post on this blog. If I am not mistaken, she was receiving so many e-mails with similar requests that she was unable to grant all the requests -- though, being a real lady, she made an effort to at least answer the e-mails she received.

During the course of this year, however, I have continued to occasionally pester Gina with questions. She has been giving my questions some thought, and has been doing some research, but does not yet have definitive answers for me. She did send me answers she had to questions she had been asked elsewhere regarding the implementation of sharia law in the West, commenting:

"One thing is for sure, I deplore the idea of sharia law being implemented in the West... so take the opportunity to put it up on your web.

Take care
Gina"

Though I only know Gina through the exchange of a few e-mails, my distinct impression is that she is honest and intelligent, and that she has a great deal of common sense and integrity -- no wonder the Islamists hate her!

I am pleased and honored now to present the thoughts Gina has asked me to share with my readers regarding sharia courts:

What is the drive behind these courts?

This is the culmination of decades of activism and ideological conditioning by Islamic institutions to incorporate the principles of separate laws for Muslims in the context of British society. More generally, it is a male-led movement, disguising itself under the rhetoric of equal rights and superficial notions of 'multiculturalism', to embed reactionary religious laws in our society, and beyond that, to increase the influence and power of Islamic values interpreted by male clerics over the lives of Muslims in Britain. Even the acceptance of the most innocuous forms of arbitration is a big stick in their hands, as they can then act out control and judgment with the sanction of the state, and can use that to intimidate or bully opponents of sharia in the Muslim community into silence, as well as Muslim women or men who do not want to be governed by this system of religious law, but are unable to deny its influence over them when it is used as a tool of arbitration with the tacit acceptance of the supposedly secular state. It is also a starting point to the long term attempts to increase the range and influence of sharia in Britain even further.

How are the courts viewed by the Muslim community? How are they viewed by women?

Most Muslims go about their daily lives without thinking about such things, because their most pressing concerns are to feed their families. Amongst conservatives there is support for the idea of basic sharia arbitration, especially when the denial of them as painted by activists like Bunglawala is erroneously generalized as discrimination against Muslims. On the other hand, all sentient non-Islamist Muslim women are horrified by the long term consequences of ceding power to sharia-ist men. We need to acknowledge that most Islamists are attempting to Islamize Britain and we need to acknowledge that sharia law is being used to discredit democracy. It is apparent that sharia law is different in may Muslim countries and very complex. The question we must ask is how will sharia judges be operating? There are serious ideological issues to consider, as well as legal, as a friend pointed out to me. Remember Anjem Chowdery (of al-Mujhajiroun) and Omar Bakri, who claimed to be judges of Uk sharia law. This is the impact of Islamist propaganda. Right now it's not the BNP I fear or militant jihadists as much as I fear the 'soft' jihadism creeping into almost every area of our lives at the grassroots level. Mr Bunglawala from the MCB seems to have an issue with the Jewish arbitrations Beth Din operating but they do not impose or contravene with British laws and rights. Above all it's not Judaismm that is in crisis, in conflict with democracies or a threat to Muslims and non-Muslims worldwide. Islam has been brought to a crisis and the sharia legal system is a major issue that cannot be resolved. It's ongoing and problematic.

What do I think government policy should be?

A brilliant barrister who has written to Muslim newspapers about Muslim marriages, Neil Addison, has already shown how Muslim practice is out of step with every other religious community in Britain, including the other main minority religious communities, in refusing to submit marriage ceremonies to British law. This leaves Muslim women and men beleaguered when marriages go wrong and they do not have the same legal rights as all non-Muslims have in a similar situation, all because many parts of the Muslim establishment in Britain refuse to deny the privileging of secular British law over sharia. The British government must openly declare a long term aim of harmonizing the Muslim community with mainstream British society, and the first step to doing this is to will into action at every level of administration in our country the intent to empower Muslim individuals by denying any religiously-inspired legal sanction against them. For the long-term emancipation of British Muslims, and for the long-term harmony of British society, there must be no legal barriers to hinder national integration between groups in our society. Anything that increases the power of imams and mullahs over Muslim women and men, and embeds their judgment and power, must be denied. The government must also be wary of 'sharia creep', where sharia is accepted tacitly. An example of this is the decision to allow the wives of a polygamous Muslim man to receive welfare benefits as a spouse. In the long term, the government is going to have to tackle issues like polygamy in the Muslim community, which is perpetuated by the reluctance of the Islamic establishment in Britain to submit their marriage laws to secular British law. In fact they need to start listening to Britsh Muslim women like Shaista Gohar and Diane Nammi, and ex-Muslim women Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Maryam Nawaazi, who all strongly oppose sharia law. Plus, how are these courts going to be monitered and how can measures be taken to stop discrimination against women in these kangaroo courts, when Islamists make no scope for any kind of progress to create change within their interpretations of sharia law, in regards to family law and the rights of Muslim women? To me sharia law is medieval.

Is a failure to recognise sharia courts de facto anti-Muslim?

No. To suggest that it is anti-Muslim is a cheap rhetorical trick employed by Islamists to mask their real agenda of special privileges and social control, and to paint Muslim opponents of sharia as being in some way traitorous or complicit in mainstream society's discrimination against Islam. The fact remains that many British Muslim women and Pakistani Muslim women oppose sharia law, as it discriminates against them as women -- wives, mothers and daughters -- particuarly in cases of domestic violence, divorce, inheritance and rape/sexual abuse.

I hope we can look forward to more posts incorporating material from Gina Khan.

Karo-Kari, Part 7

We continue from Part 6 reviewing a 1999 Amnesty International report entitled PAKISTAN: Honour killings of girls and women.

Honour killings for rape

For a woman to be targeted for killing in the name of honour, her consent -- or the lack of consent -- in an action considered shameful is irrelevant to the guardians of honour. Consequently, a woman brings shame on her family if she is raped.

In March 1999 a 16-year-old mentally retarded girl, Lal Jamilla Mandokhel, was reportedly raped several times by a junior clerk of the local government department of agriculture in a hotel in Parachinar, North West Frontier Province. The girl's uncle filed a complaint about the incident with police who took the accused into protective custody but handed over the girl to her tribe, the Mazuzai in the Kurram Agency. A jirga of Pathan tribesmen decided that she had brought shame to her tribe and that the honour could only be restored by her death. She was shot dead in front of a tribal gathering.

Nafisa Shah reports that women who expose rape and thereby dishonour their men are particularly vulnerable. Arbab Khatoon, raped by three men in a village in Jacobabad district, reportedly lodged a complaint with police. She was murdered seven hours later. According to local residents, she was killed by her relatives for bringing dishonour to the family by going to the police.⁵

Fake honour killings

In honour killings, if only the kari is killed and the karo escapes, as is often the case, the karo has to compensate the affected man -- for the damage to honour he inflicted, for the woman’s worth who was killed and to have his own life spared. This scheme provides many opportunities to make money, obtain a women in compensation or to conceal other crimes, in the near certainty that honour killings if they come to court will be dealt with leniently. Nafisa Shah speaks of an "honour killing industry" involving tribes people, police and tribal mediators.

An "honour killing industry" -- and liberals complain about American business!

In November 1997 Mussarrat Bibi, a mother of three children, pregnant and married for 11 years, was beaten to death by frenzied villagers in Chehel Khurd near Qilla Deedar Singh in Sheikupura district after rumours of her immoral behaviour spread. Inquiries revealed that the real reason for her death was that she had refused to work for the local landlords without payment. Two people were reported to have been detained briefly. Reports abound about men who have killed other men in murders not connected with honour issues who then kill a woman of their own family as alleged kari to camouflage the initial murder as an honour killing.

I wonder if any of these guys have a concept of the word "love"...?

The lure of compensation has in some cases led to publicly known distortions of truth. In Ghotki, a man reportedly vouched for his wife’s innocence after she had been attacked by his brother who alleged that she was guilty of an 'illicit' relationship. The husband took her to Karachi for treatment but when told that she would be permanently paralysed from the waist down, he reneged, declared her a kari and took a woman in compensation from the supposed karo's family.

That guy obviously doesn't.

The fact that women are often given in compensation when illicit relations are alleged has led to further perversions of the honour system. If a woman refuses to marry a man, he may declare a man of her family a karo and demand her in compensation for not killing him. In some cases, he may even kill a woman of his own family to lend weight to the allegation. Attiya Dawood cited an incident in Moorath village, related to her by the sister of the alleged karo. Her brother Amanullah had married a woman who had earlier been fond of her cousin Nazir, a married man with eight children. Unable to obtain her family's consent to marry her, Nazir murdered Amanullah, then killed his own innocent sister and declared both karo and kari. After a brief prison term, he was given Amanullah's wife, now a widow, in compensation for the supposed infringement of his honour.

There's family values -- "Til death do us part."

Punitive domestic violence against women

Honour killings are but an extreme form of violence against women. Domestic violence is also frequently intended to punish a woman for any perceived insubordination supposedly impacting on male honour. Sabira Khan, for example, who was married at 16 to a man more than twice her age, was shortly after her wedding in 1991 told by her husband that she must never see her family again. When in December 1993 she tried to break this rule, she said that he and his mother poured kerosene over her and set her on fire. She was three months pregnant. Despite 60 per cent burns she survived, badly scarred. She has fought since then to bring charges against the perpetrators -- so far in vain. The magistrate in Jhelum upheld her husband's argument that Sabira was insane and had set herself on fire. An appeal is pending in the Rawalpindi High Court bench.

Shahnaz Bokhari of the Progressive Women's Association in Islamabad says that since March 1994, when the organization was set up, it has monitored 1,600 cases of women burned in their homes in Rawalpindi and Islamabad alone. These are only the reported cases.

As this report was written in 1999, that's 1600 reported cases in only two cities in only five years.

The Islamic Republic of Pakistan protects women in accordance with Islamic Law -- and it is much more progessive than in the West!

HRCP's 1998 annual report states bluntly: "Woman's subordination remained so routine by custom and traditions, and even putatively by religion, that much of the endemic domestic violence against her was considered normal behaviour... A sample survey showed 82 per cent of women in rural Punjab feared violence resulting from husbands' displeasure over minor matters; in the most developed urban areas 52 per cent admitted being beaten by husbands."⁶

It's not just correct behavior -- it's normal!

Karo-Kari, Part 6

We continue from Part 5 reviewing a 1999 Amnesty International report entitled PAKISTAN: Honour killings of girls and women.

Honour killings for choosing a marriage partner

Expressing a desire to choose a spouse and marrying a partner of one’s choice are seen as major acts of defiance in a society where most marriages are arranged by fathers. They are seen to damage the honour of the man who negotiates the marriage and who can expect a bride price in return for handing her over to a spouse.

Oh, the things we take for granted.

And let's not kid ourselves about this -- yes, there are many Muslims who will say that arranged marriages and honor killings are un-Islamic.

And, after you subtract out al-taqqiyah, many of them truthfully believe that.

Yet, it is the people with the most backwards beliefs who are trying to spread their beliefs with the most wonton violence.

If Islamic militants get their way, all women will be veiled, subject to arranged marriages and honor killings.

And, yes -- the veil is a sign of a woman's subjugation to men in the Islamic world.

Frequently fathers bring charges of zina (unlawful sexual relations) against daughters who have married men of their choice, alleging that they are not validly married. But even when such complaints are before the courts, some men resort to private justice. According to local press reports, Sher Bano, for example, was murdered outside a court in Peshawar. She had earlier eloped with a man she wanted to marry but was arrested on charges of zina. On 6 August 1997, when she emerged under police guard from the court room after submitting her bail application, her brother shot her dead.

Women who are disowned by a family over a marriage are cut loose from their social moorings and become vulnerable to exploitation. R. [name withheld] told Amnesty International that at the age of 15 or 16 she married a man from another tribe against her family's wishes. Three years later her husband verbally divorced her. Her family had threatened to kill her for marrying a man of her choice, so she had nowhere to go. She took up begging. Eight years later she married another man but one day was recognized by her first husband who wanted her to work for him as a beggar. He threatened to bring charges of zina against her for living with another man as he denied having divorced her. She was arrested by police. The local wadera (landlord) intervened and had her brought before a magistrate who sent her to the Hyderabad Darul Aman, a government-run women’s shelter. She does not know what will happen to her next.

It is an evil system.

Satta-watta marriages, which involve exchange of siblings, put an additional burden on women to abide by their father's marriage arrangements. Shaheen was allegedly set on fire by her husband Anwar in Gujjarpura in December 1998 in a satta-watta context. Their marriage had run into trouble. Anwar wanted to send Shaheen back to her parents, Shaheen's brother, married to Anwar's sister, refused to send his wife home as well. Anwar found no other way to remove his shame than to kill his wife.

An evil system....

Often women choosing a spouse are abducted and not heard of again. At the time of writing this report, the whereabouts of Uzma Talpur who had married Nasir Rajput against her father's wishes in November 1998 were unknown. Police arrested the couple in November on the charge of Nasir Rajput's abduction of Uzma and charges of zina [fornication] against both partners despite their being validly married. In December, police handed the young woman over to her family but when her husband filed a constitutional petition in the Sindh High Court for the release of his wife from parental custody, they claimed that she had been abducted by unknown men from the court premises. In June 1999, police stated before the High Court that such an abduction had not taken place. The High Court ordered a general search for her.

Honour killings of women seeking divorce

Women who have sought divorce through the courts have been attacked, injured or killed. Seeking divorce is seen as an act of public defiance that calls for punitive action to restore male honour within the traditional setting.

On 6 April 1999, 29-year-old Samia Sarwar, a mother of two young sons, was shot dead in her lawyer's office in Lahore. She was murdered apparently because her mother and her husband's mother are sisters and Samia's attempt to divorce a husband she described to her lawyer as severely abusive, was seen to shame the family. In the 10 years of her marriage, Samia had suffered high levels of domestic violence. In 1995 she returned to her family home after her husband had thrown her down some stairs when she was pregnant. Samia fled to Lahore on 26 March 1999, seeking help in the law firm AGHS and taking refuge in the women's shelter Dastak run by AGHS lawyers. The lawyers included Hina Jilani and Asma Jahangir, who is currently UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, arbitrary and summary executions and then chairperson of the HRCP. On 6 April, when Samia Sarwar was at her lawyer's office, Samia's mother arrived accompanied by Samia's uncle and a driver. The driver shot Samia in the head, killing her instantly.

The fact that the killing was carried out in the presence of well-known lawyers indicates that the perpetrators were convinced they were doing the right thing, were not afraid of publicity and felt no need to hide their identity as they felt sure that the state would not hold them to account. They were right. Despite a First Information Report (FIR, the report filed by the complainants with police which initiates a police investigation) filed the same day, nominating Samia’s father, mother and uncle for murder, no one has yet been arrested.

Newspapers in the North West Frontier Province reported that the public overwhelmingly supported the killing, with many arguing that since it was in accordance with tradition it could not be a crime. The Chamber of Commerce in Peshawar, of which Samia's father is President, and several religious organizations demanded that Hina Jilani and Asma Jahangir be dealt with in accordance with "tribal and Islamic law" and be arrested for "misleading women in Pakistan and contributing to the country's bad image abroad". Fatwas [religious rulings] were issued against both women and head money was promised to anyone who killed them. In April 1999 Asma Jahangir lodged a FIR with police against those who had threatened her and her sister with death. Simultaneously, she called on the government to set up a judicial inquiry headed by a Supreme Court judge to investigate almost 300 cases of honour killings reported in 1998 in Pakistan. No action is known to have been taken on either issue.

That they "be dealt with in accordance with 'tribal and Islamic law'" -- Islamic law....Up jumps the devil!

On 11 May, Samia’s father lodged a complaint with Peshawar police accusing the two women lawyers with the abduction and murder of Samia. They obtained bail before arrest. A month later, the Peshawar High Court admitted their petition to quash the case and ordered police not to take any adverse action against the lawyers on the basis on this complaint.

Lawyers who specialize in Islamic law... and we complain about our attorneys!

Stay tuned!

Karo-Kari, Part 5

We continue from Part 4 reviewing a 1999 Amnesty International report entitled PAKISTAN: Honour killings of girls and women.

Two main factors contribute to violence against women: women's commodification and conceptions of honour. The concept of women as a commodity, not human beings endowed with dignity and rights equal to those of men, is deeply rooted in tribal culture. Dr Tahira Shahid Khan of Shirkatgah, a woman's resource centre worker, explains: "Women are considered the property of the males in their family irrespective of their class, ethnic or religious group. The owner of the property has the right to decide its fate. The concept of ownership has turned women into a commodity which can be exchanged, bought and sold..."¹

Ownership rights are at stake when women are to be married, almost always in Pakistan by their parents. A major consideration is the property or assets that the young woman has a right to inherit one day. A woman is handed over to her spouse against payment of a bride price to her father; sometimes that bride price includes another woman given to the father as a new wife. Some men accept a low bride price on condition that the as yet unborn daughter of the couple will be returned to them to be married off for another bride price. The commodification of women is also the basis of the tradition of khoon baha (blood money) when a woman is handed over to an adversary to settle a conflict.

Can't they trade goats or something? Does it have to be people?

Obviously, the men in traditional societies in Pakistan don't think women are people.

Women are seen to embody the honour of the men to whom they 'belong', as such they must guard their virginity and chastity. By being perceived to enter an 'illicit' sexual relationship, a woman defiles the honour of her guardian and his family. She becomes kari and forfeits the right to life.

In most communities there is no other punishment for a kari but death. A man’s ability to protect his honour is judged by his family and neighbours. He must publicly demonstrate his power to safeguard his honour by killing those who damaged it and thereby restore it. Honour killings consequently are often performed openly.

So, if you wife or daughter gets raped, you have to kill her to show you're a bad-ass.

Now, that's progressive!

The perception of what defiles honour has become very loose. Male control extends not just to a woman's body and her sexual behaviour, but to all of her behaviour, including her movements and language. In any of these areas, defiance by women translates into undermining male honour. Severe punishments are reported for bringing food late, for answering back, for undertaking forbidden family visits. Standards of honour and chastity are not applied equally to men and women, even though they are supposed to. Surveys conducted in the North West Frontier Province and in Balochistan found that men often go unpunished for 'illicit' relationships whereas women are killed on the merest rumour of 'impropriety'.

A society insecure in its masculinity, perhaps?

(Does that make them a bunch of wimps, with something to prove?)

A man's honour, defiled by a woman's alleged or real sexual misdemeanour or other defiance, is only partly restored by killing her. He also has to kill the man allegedly involved. Since a kari is murdered first, the karo often hears about it and flees.

To settle the issue, a faislo (agreement, meeting) or jirga is set up if both sides - the man whose honour is defiled and the escaped karo - agree; it is attended by representatives of both sides and headed by the local tribal chief (sardar), his subordinate or a local landlord. The tribal justice dispensed by the jirga or faislo is not intended to elicit truth and punish the culprit. Justice means restoring the balance by compensation for damage. The karo who gets away has to pay compensation in order for his life to be spared. Compensation can be in the form of money or the transfer of a woman or both.

Official claims that women's rights are not understood in backward rural areas ignore the fact that there are many urban honour killings and considerable support for them among the educated. For example, Samia Sarwar's mother, a doctor, facilitated the honour killing of her daughter in Lahore in April 1999 when Samia sought divorce from an abusive husband (see below). Shahtaj Qisalbash, a witness during the killing, reported that Samia’s mother was "cool and collected during the getaway, walking away from the murder of her daughter as though the woman slumped in her own blood was a stranger."

Divorce from an abusive husband leads to murder of the abused wife by the father.

Now that's progressive women's rights!

The frequency of karo-kari killings and the unexpectedness with which women are targeted contributes to an atmosphere of fear among young women. The poet Attiya Dawood quoted a pubescent girl in a small Sindhi village: "My brother’s eyes forever follow me. My father's gaze guards me all the time, stern, angry... We stand accused and condemned to be declared kari and murdered."²

"The frequency of karo-kari killings and the unexpectedness with which women are targeted contributes to an atmosphere of fear among young women."

Imagine that!

International support for women fleeing abroad when they fear for their lives from their families' death threats has been hesitant. The threat to the lives of women who refuse to accept their fathers' decision relating to their marriages has only recently been recognized as grounds for granting asylum to such women.³

"International support for women fleeing abroad when they fear for their lives from their families' death threats has been hesitant."

Why is that?

Stay tuned!

Karo-Kari, Part 4

We begin this part by continuing our review of a 1999 Amnesty International report entitled PAKISTAN: Honour killings of girls and women; we are still in the introduction to the report:

Abuses by private actors such as honour killings are crimes under the country's criminal laws. However, systematic failure by the state to prevent and to investigate them and to punish perpetrators leads to international responsibility of the state. The Government of Pakistan has taken no measures to end honour killings and to hold perpetrators to account. It has failed to train police and judges to be gender neutral and to amend discriminatory laws. It has ignored Article 5 of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, which it ratified in 1996, which obliges states to "modify the social and cultural patterns of conduct of men and women" to eliminate prejudice and discriminatory traditions.

Since that report was written in 1999, the Government of Pakistan has made an effort to end honor killings. From Honour killing and "karo kari" in Pakistan by Qaiser Felix, July, 2004, we catch a glimpse of the legal battle that ultimately led to a law on the books:

Islamabad (AsiaNews) Honour crimes are an archaic practice in Pakistan. Although precise figures are hard to obtain, especially for the more remote rural and tribal areas, Pakistan is thought to hold the world record in honour crimes.

Karo kari is a compound word literally meaning "black male" and "black female," metaphoric terms for adulterer and adulteress. Being so labelled leads more often than not to the murder of both man and woman allegedly guilty of having an illicit affair. This is especially true in the rural areas of the southern province of Sindh. In other parts of the country, women are more likely to be accused of sexual improprieties and murdered in order to wash the sullied family honour.

Official data recently published by the Pakistani Senate show that more than 4,000 people died in the last 6 years as result of karo-kari. Of the victims almost 2,800 were women and just over 1,300 were men. Thus twice as many women as men lose their lives to this most barbaric social custom.

The data show that the highest number of karo kari killings were perpetrated in Punjab province followed by Sindh, the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP), and the south-western province of Baluchistan. Some non governmental and media sources suggest that prior to 1998 Sindh topped the list.

Of the 2,774 murdered women, 1,578 were killed in Punjab, 751 in Sindh, 260 in NWFP and 185 in Baluchistan. Of the 1,327 murdered men, 675 were killed in Punjab, 348 in Sindh, 188 in NWFP and 116 in Baluchistan.

Although 4,101 people were victims of honour killings only 3,451 cases were brought before the courts: 1,834 in Punjab, 980 in Sindh, 361 in NWFP and 276 in Baluchistan.

Interior Minister Faisal Saleh Hayat and Law Minister Raza Hayat Hiraj speaking before the Senate said the government would soon table a bill banning honour crimes and karo kari. Parliament began debating on Tuesday, July 20, an amendment to the Penal Code introduced by the Pakistan People's Party-Parliamentarians (PPPP) that would impose long sentences to anyone guilty of honour crimes and karo kari. The PPPP's action was also intended to block attempts by other parties to leave the matter outside the purview of the Law.

The PPPP's Chaudhry Aitzaz Ahsan, speaking in favour of the amendment, said the Pakistan Penal Code should be changed so as to rid the law books of honour crimes and karo kari. He insisted that honour killings are murders and guilty parties should be punished with a life sentence. He urged legislators belonging to the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal, a six-party Islamic alliance, as well as religious groups to support the amendment. He insisted that it was high time that Shariah law come under closer scrutiny to stop it from being abused.

Back now to PAKISTAN: Honour killings of girls and women:

Some apologists claim that traditional practices as genuine manifestations of a community's culture may not be subjected to scrutiny from the perspective of rights contained in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Against this, the 1993 World Conference on Human Rights in the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action stated: "All human rights are universal, indivisible and interdependent and interrelated" and asserted the duty of states "to promote all human rights and fundamental freedoms". The United Nations General Assembly in 1993 adopted the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women which urges states not to "invoke custom, tradition or religious consideration to avoid their obligation" to eliminate discriminatory treatment of women. While recognizing the importance of cultural diversity, Amnesty International stands resolutely in defence of the universality of human rights, particularly the most fundamental rights to life and freedom from torture and ill-treatment. The role of the state is to ensure the full protection of these rights, where necessary mediating 'tradition' through education and the law.

This report is the fourth in a series issued by Amnesty International on the rights of women in Pakistan; it is the first to look at abuses of women's rights by private actors.

Killings in the name of honour

Ghazala was set on fire by her brother in Joharabad, Punjab province, on 6 January 1999. According to reports, she was murdered because her family suspected she was having an 'illicit' relationship with a neighbour. Her burned and naked body reportedly lay unattended on the street for two hours as nobody wanted to have anything to do with it.

Ghazala was burned to death in the name of honour. Hundreds of other women and girls suffer a similar fate every year amid general public support and little or no action by the authorities. In fact, there is every sign that the number of honour killings is on the rise as the perception of what constitutes honour -- and what damages it -- widens, and as more murders take on the guise of honour killings on the correct assumption that they are rarely punished.

Often, honour killings are carried out on the flimsiest of grounds, such as by a man who said he had dreamt that his wife had betrayed him. State institutions -- the law enforcement apparatus and the judiciary -- deal with these crimes against women with extraordinary leniency and the law provides many loopholes for murderers in the name of honour to kill without punishment. As a result, the tradition remains unbroken.

The methods of honour killings vary. In Sindh, a kari (literally a 'black woman') and a karo ('a black man') are hacked to pieces by axe and hatchets, often with the complicity of the community. In Punjab, the killings, usually by shooting, are more often based on individual decisions and carried out in private. In most cases, husbands, fathers or brothers of the woman concerned commit the killings. In some cases, jirgas (tribal councils) decide that the woman should be killed and send men to carry out the deed.

The victims range from pre-pubescent girls to grandmothers. They are usually killed on the mere allegation of having entered 'illicit' sexual relationships. They are never given an opportunity to give their version of the allegation as there is no point in doing so -- the allegation alone is enough to defile a man’s honour and therefore enough to justify the killing of the woman.

According to the non-governmental Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), 286 women were reported to have been killed for reasons of honour in 1998 in the Punjab alone. The Special Task Force for Sindh of the HRCP received reports of 196 cases of karo-kari killings in Sindh in 1998, involving 255 deaths. The real number of such killings is vastly greater than those reported.

Pakistani women abroad do not escape the threat of honour killings. The Nottingham crown court in the United Kingdom in May 1999 sentenced a Pakistani woman and her grown-up son to life imprisonment for murdering the woman's daughter, Rukhsana Naz, a pregnant mother of two children. Rukhsana was perceived to have brought shame on the family by having a sexual relationship outside marriage. Her brother reportedly strangled Rukhsana, while her mother held her down.

The country bringing us this, and whose government takes no serious action to stop it all, is our ally in the War on Terror -- and it has nuclear weapons.

Karo-Kari, Part 3

We continue from Part 2 with Honor Killings Plague Pakistan, from Islam OnLine (IOL):

Government Blamed

Many blamed the government for failing to stem this social cancer.

"The government is not serious to take any concrete step to curb this menace," Iqbal Haider, Secretary General of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), told IOL.

An important point to keep in mind -- the Government of Pakistan "is not serious to take any concrete step to curb" honor killings.

Pakistan outlawed honor killings, but the problem has not gone away; the Government of Pakistan has not really been trying to stop honor killings.

Makes me wonder if Benazir Bhutto was not assassinated to save someone's sense of honor...?

Haider, a former federal law minister, said that different women rights organizations had constituted a committee under his chairmanship last year, which proposed to the government declaring honor killing an "uncompromisable" crime.

"In 90 percent cases of honor killings, the culprits are close relatives (father, brother, uncle or cousin) and therefore they are easily forgiven by the family of the deceased," he noted.

"If the government is serious to curb this phenomenon, it has to repeal the clause of Wali (guardian) vis-à-vis honor killings from Pakistan Penal Code," insisted the HRC chief.

"Murder is not an offense against an individual. It is a social evil, which terrorizes the society, therefore strict legal and administrative steps must be taken to wipe out this phenomenon."

"Murder is not an offense against an individual. It is a social evil, which terrorizes the society, therefore strict legal and administrative steps must be taken to wipe out this phenomenon."

Haider said the parliament fails to draft an appropriate legislation against honor killings because of the influence of feudal lords there.

"Most of the parliamentarians consider honor killings as part of their culture and matter of their honor, which in realty is not."

Honor killings are supposed to be prosecuted under ordinary murder in Pakistan, but in practice police and prosecutors often ignore it.

Often a man must simply claim the killing was for his honor and he'll go free.

In 2004, the parliament passed a bill making honor killings punishable by a prison term of seven years while the death penalty could be inflicted in the most extreme cases.

Culture

Rakshanda Naz, Joint Director of Aurat (Women) Foundation, said the government had taken some initiatives against the ugly crime, but it was focusing on procedural amendments rather than amending the main law.

"For instance, honor killing should be treated as crime against state, but practically it is not," she said.

"Even if court refuses for settlement, then the option of out of court settlement is still there, which favors the culprits as in most of the cases close relatives are the killers."

Naz believes the phenomenon could not be controlled 100 percent as it remained part of society in different shapes during different times.

"This phenomenon varies in different provinces of Pakistan," she said.

"In NWFP, a majority of decisions regarding honor killings are taken on individual or family basis, while in Sindh and Punjab this decision is taken by jirga or Punchayat (assembly of tribal elders)," noted Naz.

"Ratio of honor killings is higher in those provinces where agriculture lands are abundant. Land is the main reason behind a majority of honor killing incidents in Sindh and Punjab."

Investigations in most honor killing cases reveal that the victims - males and females - have been killed by their relatives to confiscate their properties, settle down personal enmities and tribal feuds or implicate rivals in false cases.

As I pointed out in Part 2, the concept of "honor killings" is abused, even by the perverted rules that justify it.

Naz insists that the tribal culture and mentality remains one of the major reasons behind honor killings in Pakistan.

"Tribal leaders have set up their own courts to decide about life and death of their respective tribesmen. Unfortunately, these tribal lords are dominant in parliament too. Therefore, they don't let any adequate legislation pass against this heinous crime."

Similar practices have been known since ancient Roman times, when the Pater Familias (senior male within a household) retained the right to kill an unmarried but sexually active daughter or an adulterous wife.

Stay tuned!

Karo-Kari, Part 2

We begin this part by reviewing a 1999 Amnesty International report entitled PAKISTAN: Honour killings of girls and women.

Introduction

Women in Pakistan live in fear. They face death by shooting, burning or killing with axes if they are deemed to have brought shame on the family. They are killed for supposed 'illicit' relationships, for marrying men of their choice, for divorcing abusive husbands. They are even murdered by their kin if they are raped as they are thereby deemed to have brought shame on their family. The truth of the suspicion does not matter -- merely the allegation is enough to bring dishonour on the family and therefore justifies the slaying.

The lives of millions of women in Pakistan are circumscribed by traditions which enforce extreme seclusion and submission to men. Male relatives virtually own them and punish contraventions of their proprietary control with violence. For the most part, women bear traditional male control over every aspect of their bodies, speech and behaviour with stoicism, as part of their fate, but exposure to media, the work of women's groups and a greater degree of mobility have seen the beginnings of women's rights awareness seep into the secluded world of women. But if women begin to assert their rights, however tentatively, the response is harsh and immediate: the curve of honour killings has risen parallel to the rise in awareness of rights.

As they have gained exposure to the outside world, women in South Asia have started to realize that the oppressive prison that traditional culture is for them is not the same for women elsewhere. Exposure to the outside world is beginning to challenge and destroy long-held beliefs.

Part of the reaction to this is the rise of reactionary ideologies that seek to preserve and enforce these traditional ways -- and that's what the Taliban is all about.

Every year hundreds of women are known to die as a result of honour killings. Many more cases go unreported and almost all go unpunished. The isolation and fear of women living under such threats are compounded by state indifference to and complicity in women's oppression. Police almost invariably take the man's side in honour killings or domestic murders, and rarely prosecute the killers. Even when the men are convicted, the judiciary ensures that they usually receive a light sentence, reinforcing the view that men can kill their female relatives with virtual impunity. Specific laws hamper redress as they discriminate against women.

The isolation of women is completed by the almost total absence of anywhere to hide. There are few women's shelters, and any woman attempting to travel on her own is a target for abuse by police, strangers or male relatives hunting for her. For some women suicide appears the only means of escape.

Is this Islamic, though?

From Honor Killings Plague Pakistan by Aamir Latif, IOL (IOL = Islam OnLine) Correspondent, January 11, 2007:

KARACHI — Hooran, another victim of the cancer custom of honor killing, known locally as Karo-Kari, exudes a mix of fear and hopelessness in her broad brown eyes despite the fact that she defeated a sure death.

"I and my parents begged them, but they didn't listen to us," a pale and week Hooran, 14, told IslamOnline.net from her hospital bed at a local hospital in Pakistan's southern port city of Karachi.

"They (her cousins) looked happy and proud. We were crying, and begging for mercy, when they pointed their pistols at me," she recalled fighting back the tears.

"They fired at me and I fell down. The only thing I remember was the screams of my mother."

Hooran was abducted by her cousins, who suspected she had had illicit relations with Ghulam Ahmad, on November 24 from Malir, a suburban area near Karachi, along with her father and mother.

The cousins shot at Hooran in front of her parents, who begged for the life of their child who was soaked in her own blood.

But the real cousins had no mercy for her. They threw the "body" of Hooran in a crater and drove off with the wailing couple.

The next day, a passerby saw the 14-year-old girl lying unconscious and immediately informed the nearby police check post.

Breaking the tradition, the local police acted swiftly and rushed her to a local hospital in precarious condition with five bullets in her belly, arm and legs.

Doctors had little hopes for her survival, as she was almost dead. But miracles do happen, and she came out of the clutches of death.

Karo-Kari is a compound word literally meaning "black male" and "black female," metaphoric terms for adulterer and adulteress.

Being so labeled leads more often than not to the murder of both man and woman allegedly guilty of having an illicit affair.

This is especially true in the rural areas of the southern province of Sindh.

Hunted

Hooran hails from Larkana district of Sindh province, the hometown of former premier Benazir Bhutto.

Her father, a farmer, moved the family to Karachi a few months back after her cousins tried to kill her on the pretext of Karo-Kari.

They had already killed the alleged Karo a few months back.

To save their daughter's life, the parents immediately shifted to Karachi but the hunters did not leave her.

Hooran said she along with her parents and the relatives who provided them shelter in a car at Super Highway when all of a sudden a car cut them off the road.

Two armed men, who later appeared to be her cousins, alighted the car.

They left the family that had provided shelter to Hooran and her parents and took them away.

Hooran denies that she ever had an affair with slain Ghulam Ahmad.

"I even didn't know him. Actually, one of my cousins wanted to marry me, and he had asked my parents for that, but they refused," she recalled.

"Following my parents' refusal, my cousins blamed me for having relations with Ghulam Ahmad, whom I had never seen," Hooran insisted.

"My and my parents' lives are still in danger. I don't know how and where my parents are and whether they are or alive?"

The phenomenon of "honor killings" is abused, even according to the perverted rules that justify such murders. They are used to intimidate women into marrying undesireable men, under threat that the woman will be accused of a crime and murdered if she does not agree. In domestic life, if you are married to a woman you don't like, and lust after your neighbor's wife, you can accuse your wife and your neighbor of having an affair. You then kill your wife and your neighbor, and keep your neighbor's widow, all as payment to defend the dishonor you allege was done to you.

This really happens, and we will hear of examples.

Continuing with Honor Killings Plague Pakistan:

Cancer

Hooran is one of the few victims of honor killings who managed to survive to narrate their stories.

The graveyards of Upper Sindh districts are filled with the graves of those innocents men and women who have been killed in the name of so-called honor.

"There is no mention of honor killing in the Qur'an or Hadiths," Professor Hassamuddin Mansoori, Chairman of the Shari`ah Department in the University of Karachi, told IOL.

"Honor killing, in Islamic definitions, refers specifically to extra-legal punishment by the family against the woman and is forbidden by Shari`ah," he averred.

"Islam strictly prohibits murder and killing without legal justification," said the expert.

"The so-called honor killing is based on ignorance and disregard of morals and laws."

Some 40 Pakistani religious scholars belonging to different schools of thought have recently issued a joint fatwa against honor killings.

They branded the heinous custom un-Islamic and devoid of the teachings of Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him).

According to official statistics in 2006, as many as 1,261 women were murdered in the name of honor killings in Pakistan.

Official data presented in the country's Upper House Senate shows that more than 4,000 people were killed during last 6 years in the name of honor killings.

Of the victims almost 2,774 were women and 1.226 were men which means twice as many women lose their lives to this ugly social custom.

But unofficial statistics suggest that the number of victims is much higher because most the cases are not reported to police since close family members, including brothers, fathers and husbands might be involved.

The data shows that the highest number of honor killings were perpetrated in Punjab province followed by Sindh, the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP), and the south-western province of Baluchistan.

As I pointed out in Part 1, though, Islam is in the eyes of the beholder, and there are too many people in the Islamic world who believe that honor killings are Islamic -- and these are usually the kind of people who spread their belief system at gunpoint, murdering infidels and those Muslims who, like the women in these stories, are not properly Islamic enough.

Stay tuned!

Karo-Kari, Part 1

We begin this series by reviewing an article entitled Pakistani lawmaker defends honor killings; Tribesmen bury five women alive for wanting to choose their own husbands, August 30, 2008; the story has received a great deal of coverage in the international media, and various versions of it can be found easily by doing an Internet search.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - A Pakistani lawmaker defended a decision by southwestern tribesmen to bury five women alive because they wanted to choose their own husbands, telling stunned members of Parliament this week to spare him their outrage.

"These are centuries-old traditions and I will continue to defend them," Israr Ullah Zehri, who represents Baluchistan province, said Saturday. "Only those who indulge in immoral acts should be afraid."

All cultures and all cultural traditions are not equally valid. Some traditions are flat out evil, and need to be ended.

The women, three of whom were teenagers, were first shot and then thrown into a ditch.

They were still breathing as their bodies were covered with rocks and mud, according media reports and human rights activists, who said their only "crime" was that they wished to marry men of their own choosing.

When similar such lynchings happened to Americans of African descent in the South, society finally decried such lynchings enough to have an impact on the cultural traditions there and change them.

Will that happen now, or will the multiculturalist hypocrites chicken out, and say we shouldn't judge such murders of women?

Zehri told a packed and flabbergasted Parliament on Friday that Baluch tribal traditions helped stop obscenity and then asked fellow lawmakers not to make a big fuss about it.

I wonder what these guys would do if they ever got their hands on America's Hollywood crowd?

Many stood up in protest, saying the executions were "barbaric" and demanding that discussions continue Monday. But a handful said it was an internal matter of the deeply conservative province.

"I was shocked," said lawmaker Nilofar Bakhtiar, who pushed for legislation calling for perpetrators of so-called honor killings to be punished when she served as minister of women's affairs under the last government.

"I feel that we've gone back to the starting point again," she said. "It's really sad for me."

Accounts vary

The incident allegedly occurred one month ago in Baba Kot, a remote village in Jafferabad district, after the women decided to defy tribal elders and arrange marriages in a civil court, according to the Asian Human Rights Commission.

They were said to have been abducted at gunpoint by six men, forced into a vehicle and taken to a remote field, where they were beaten, shot and then buried alive, it said, accusing local authorities of trying to hush up the killings.

One of perpetrators was allegedly related to a top provincial official, it said.

Accounts about the killings have varied, largely because police in the tribal region have been uncooperative. Activists and lawmakers said a more thorough investigation needed to be carried out.

The Asian Human Rights Commission, however, said the two older women may have been related to some of the teenage girls and were apparently murdered because they were sympathetic to their wishes.

This is an old problem in Pakistan, one going back centuries.

This problem is one of cultural traditions, not necessarily related to religion. In fact, as this series continues, we will look at mainstream Islamic scholars who vehemently condemn such "honor killings".

However, Islam is in the eyes of the beholder, and for certain elements in the Islamic world, such traditions are part-and-parcel of Islam -- and some of those elements are spreading their beliefs by every means available, including by the sword.

Stay tuned!

Saleema

We begin with a story from a Christian website. The story is undated, but the events described began in 1997. Here is Saleema!, by Tom White:

Saleema grew up in a Christian family in Pakistan. To her, faith in Jesus Christ is a part of everyday life and often comes with great costs. Saleema knows the dangers of sharing her faith in the Muslim stronghold of Pakistan, but like thousands of other Christians, that does not prevent her from being a living witness of her Lord and Savior.

Last year, Saleema gave a bible to a friend of hers who was also a Muslim. This Muslim friend was so impressed by what she read that she immediately fell in love with Christ. She longed to know more about Jesus, and on Good Friday, she found the courage to attend a Chritsian church.

It was on this day that Saleema's friend heard, for the first time, of the crucifixion, the atonement, and the resurrection of Jesus. She had read about Jesus in the Koran, but the Islamic Holy Book failed to mention his crucifixion and atonement for sin. That morning before returning home she gave her life to Jesus Christ.

Her parents were very disturbed by the news. According to Islamic law, their daughter was guilty of blasphemy against the prophet Mohammed. Saleema's friend was beaten, kicked and tortured by her parents. However, she would not deny Christ. In fact, the more she suffered for Jesus, the more she loved Him.

Her parents continued the persecution and decided it would be best to give their daughter in marriage to a Muslim man. It was at this time that Saleema's friend had no choice but to leave her home and go into hiding.

When the girl's parents discovered that she was missing, they immediately went to Saleema's home believing that she was guilty of hiding their daughter. They demanded to know her whereabouts. Saleema told them that she did not know where their daughter was and that her family had nothing to do with her disappearance.

Saleema, along with her parents, was picked by the Islamic authorities and interrogated for three days. They were beaten, starved, and continually questioned. As part of the torture, Saleema was forced to stand on the tips of her toes for over twelve hours. Each time she came down from this excruciating position, a stick came across her back. Saleema was eventually handed over to the police.

Saleema's pastor was also arrested and placed in the cell with her. The guards removed the prisoner's clothing and attempted to force Saleema and her pastor to commit adultery. When they refused, they were again beaten. The pastor's son was also arrested, hung upside down in a tree, and nearly beaten to death.

Every day and every night Saleema was tortured. Her tormentors inflicted unspeakable wounds both physically and emotionally. Saleema is an attractive young woman, and she was repeatedly violated.

Three weeks after Saleema was handed over to the police, the young Muslim girl who had turned her life over to Jesus, was discovered hiding in a woman's shelter. Her Muslim parents brought her back to her village where she was publicly executed. She was only a Christian for a few months when she learned the meaning of being "faithful unto death."

Saleema has since been charged with the girl's death. The judge found her guilty on two counts, 1> for proselytizing a Muslim girl, and 2> causing the events leading up to the girl's execution. Saleema now faces murder charges, and if found guilty under blasphemy law 295c, will herself be executed.

This tragic story is all too common in Muslim nations like Pakistan, where our family in Christ, our brothers and sisters, are beaten, tortured and even killed for their faith. It is for Saleema and so many others like her, that The Voice of the Martyrs exist. Your brothers and sisters need your prayers. They need your encouragement. They need to know that they are not forgotten, and that we will do everything in our power to help them.

More on the story can be found in a March, 1999, piece entitled Pakistani Teen Still in Legal Trouble:

28 March 1999 (Newsroom)--A Pakistani teenager arrested for helping to convert her Muslim friend to Christianity remains in legal jeopardy but is not dead or about to be executed, as some reports spread via the Internet assert. She and her pastor both were tortured while in police custody, however, Pakistani human rights groups claim, and her friend is dead.

Saleema (likely a pseudonym to protect her security) is accused of the crime of "converting a Muslim." According to International Christian Concern (ICC), a Washington, D.C.-based rights group, Saleema has not appeared at several scheduled court hearings. ICC President Steven Snyder believes that is either out of concern for her safety or because her advocates want to draw more attention to the case.

"We feel her case could be resolved," Snyder says. "Our concern is that there may be some Christians manipulating Saleema to maintain this as a high profile case in order to keep attention on the persecution of Christians in Pakistan."

The events leading to Saleema's arrest began in 1997 in the city of Sheikhupura in Punjab province when the then-17-year-old gave her friend, Raheela Khanam, a Bible. Saleema apparently had a part in the 18-year-old Muslim girl's conversion to Christianity. Under Islamic law, or Shari'a, converting from Islam to another faith--called apostasy--is punishable by death. Though the Pakistani civil code does not apply the death penalty to apostasy, Shari'a is often enforced by private citizens, who consider it their duty as a Muslim. On July 8, 1997, the local newspaper reported that Raheela was shot to death by her brother Altaf Khanam, who then turned himself in to police.

Sources in Pakistan connected to Advocates International, a Virginia-based Christian legal agency, say that shortly before her death Raheela had sought refuge at the home of her pastor, Arthur Salim, but was turned away. The pastor, according to ICC, is from Wandalla Junction, a community in the Shadara section of Lahore. ICC sources say that Altaf Khanam illegally detained Salim for two days, accusing him and his son Robin of kidnapping Raheela. On June 23, 1997, Khanam turned over the pastor to police. A day later, police jailed Robin as well.

Salim reportedly made a written compromise with the Khanam family that allowed him to be released with his son on July 4, 1997. While in custody, Salim told members of two Lahore-based human rights groups that he had been tortured by police. In response, the Center for Legal Aid, Assistance, and Settlement (CLAAS) filed a petition in Lahore High Court on June 17, 1999. CLAAS and the group Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) reported that when they visited Salim in jail he could not stand up due to the severity of the torture. But the pastor denied the charge when called before the court on June 30, 1997 and the case was dismissed. A few days after Salim's release, Raheela was murdered.

According to some accounts, the Khanam family pressed murder charges against Saleema because of her role in the conversion. ICC's Snyder questions that. "We have not seen any evidence that there was a murder charge brought by the family," he says.

Nevertheless, authorities took Saleema into custody at Sheikhupura jail shortly after Raheela's murder. On July 14, 1997, members of CLAAS visited Saleema at the jail. She told the rights group that police severely beat her with her clothes off, using a leather belt and hose pipes. She accused police of raping her and burning sensitive parts of her body with a hot iron rod and cigarette butts.

In its 1997 report on human rights in Pakistan, the U.S. State Department reported similar cases. A study of Lahore newspapers from January to July 1997 by the Commission of Inquiry for Women found 52 cases of violence or torture of women while in police custody, the State Department said.

Saleema was released on bail Aug. 7, 1997, facing the charge of converting a Muslim. According to Snyder, a guilty verdict would be punishable by no more than two years in prison.

Though Saleema did not make a required February 15 court appearance, sources say that negotiations are under way to drop charges against her. Legally, her prospects are good, according to a spokesman for an agency involved in the case that requests anonymity due its sensitive nature. "The way the case is going it doesn't look like the court will convict her," the spokesman said. "We are encouraging people not to call Pakistani authorities (on Saleema's behalf). There have been literally thousands of calls to Pakistani embassies, which has created bumps in the road."

Advocates International confirmed in a statement that Saleema so far has not been convicted of any crime and therefore is not in imminent danger of execution. The agency says it got involved because of queries from a number of Christians who had heard various versions of the story through the Internet. "We went to our own sources in Pakistan," says Wallace Cheney, Advocates director of international programs. "Our biggest concern is that if somebody is about to be executed we want to know and help, but we also are concerned about people embellishing a story."

Several sources point out, however, that in Pakistan people who have been acquitted of religion-related crimes have been killed by private citizens after leaving the court.

A couple months later, a short update at a Christian website appeared informing us that Saleema was acquitted:

In June 1997 the young Pakistani girl Raheela came to Christ through the influence of her 17-year-old friend, Saleema. Saleema and her pastor, Salim, were detained and beaten.

When Raheela's brother, Altaf, murdered her on 8 July 1997 for apostasy and for refusing to marry a Muslim man, Saleema was blamed and arrested again. In jail she was beaten, burned, raped, and received permanent and disfiguring injuries.

On 7 August 1997 Saleema was released on bail. In late April of this year the court acquitted Saleema. But Saleema's life and the lives of all those who have nurtured her are still in danger from Muslim extremists who won't accept the court's verdict. Pastor Salim and his family have already fled their homeland.

Of course, that is not the end of the line for one accused of converting a Muslim.

From Pakistani women unite against victimisation, Wednesday, April 6, 2005:

In a landmark move for human rights, Pakistani women protested peacefully on the streets of Karachi, Quetta and Peshawar against the victimization of Christian women on International Women's Day (March 8). According to Christian human rights activist Shahbaz Bhatti, "Subjugation of Christian and minority women is common in the Muslim social strata; they are harassed, tortured, raped and forcefully converted to Islam.

In a landmark move for human rights, Pakistani women protested peacefully on the streets of Karachi, Quetta and Peshawar against the victimization of Christian women on International Women's Day (March 8). According to Christian human rights activist Shahbaz Bhatti, "Subjugation of Christian and minority women is common in the Muslim social strata; they are harassed, tortured, raped and forcefully converted to Islam.

"Since the enforcement of sharia laws, thousands of women have been unjustly involved with the criminal justice system and subjected to sexual assault, torture and illegal confinement. Social attitudes, cultural practices and religious precepts in Pakistan have allowed violence against women, and the law has failed to provide safeguard against violence or to promote attitude conducive to the women's enjoyment of their fundamental rights.

"Minority women are victimized, harassed, tortured, raped, abducted and forcefully converted to Islam, due to their Christian faith. Those who commit these crimes (extremist elements and perpetrators) consider it to be part of jihad (Holy War) and give a cover of religion to their crimes."

"No compulsion in religion" - brought to you by the Religion of Peace.

Pride of Lions, Part 9

In Part 8, we looked at how Al Qaeda and other Islamic terrorist groups are coordinating their efforts to target France for unrest. We also considered in Part 5 and Part 6 how France may be moving in the direction of a civil war.

In Part 7, we looked at how British mosques serve as a forum for the spread of hatred and calls for violence among radical elements of the Islamic community against infidel cultures.

It is not just Muslims being radicalized by some elements within their mosques; as we also saw in Part 6, there is a deliberate effort on the part of Islamic terrorists to recruit "lily whites", who are people with no prior connection to Islam or to terrorism, for conversion to Islam and deployment as terrorists in the jihad against the infidel world.

Now we consider Salmond backs plans for Islamic faith school by Murdo MacLeod, Political Correspondent, May 18, 2008:

SCOTLAND'S first state-funded Islamic school could get the go-ahead within months after First Minister Alex Salmond declared he was "sympathetic" towards the controversial move.

Campaigners are planning to submit a detailed proposal for the faith school to Glasgow City Council within two months and officials last night confirmed they would consult on the proposal.

But former Scottish education minister Sam Galbraith condemned the move as a "retrograde step", arguing that it would be bad for the Muslim community by hindering integration.

Do the opinionmakers and leaders within the Muslim community want Muslims to integrate - or to dominate?

Scotland has around 43,000 Muslims, about 18,000 of them in Glasgow. While there are more than 100 Islamic schools south of the border, both private and state-supported, Scottish Muslims have so far failed to establish a faith school and some in the community question whether it is a good idea in an age of increased ethnic and religious tension.

Scotland has more than 400 publicly funded Roman Catholic schools as well as three state-supported Scottish Episcopalian schools and a publicly funded Jewish school.

A spokesman for Salmond said: "We are very much sympathetic to the idea. The First Minister is supportive. He thinks that faith schools are a good thing and they make a great contribution to Scotland. The issue is whether there is a sustainable demand for them.

"We would expect a local authority to react positively where there is a sustainable case."

After failing in a previous campaign, a group of Muslim community leaders in Glasgow is preparing a case for at least one school, which they will present in about two months' time. They are gathering names of families who they think will want to send their children to an Islamic school.

A spokesman for the campaign said: "We're working on things right now so that we can present a strong case to the authority – to show that we are united behind this and that there are enough of us so that the case is obviously sustainable."

Glasgow City Council said it would consider any reasonable plan that parents could come up with. A spokeswoman for council leader Stephen Purcell said: "Basically, if the parents come forward with a sustainable plan, both financially and educationally, we will consult on that plan."

We now consider some background regarding that Glasgow situation, reviewing Glasgow Opposes Muslim School, dated Sun., Oct. 29, 2006 / Shawal 7, 1427:

CAIRO — Senior education officials in the Scottish city of Glasgow oppose the establishment of a state-funded Islamic school though other faith communities in the second largest city in the country have their own, according to a secret memo made public on Sunday, October 29.

The document, obtained by the Scotland on Sunday newspaper under the Freedom of Information legislation, cites "serious concerns about an inclusive education for Muslims in the city beyond faith and the social isolation of Muslim children within the city."

It adds that senior officials at Glasgow City Council had written to the head of the authority's education committee, Margaret McCafferty, about their reservations.

"Why would we assume that a state-funded Muslim school would not see the same problems that the privately funded Iqra Academy in Glasgow experienced and was subsequently closed by Her Majesty's Inspectors of Education?"

The academy was closed down in 2003 after inspectors had accused its administration of devoting too much time to Islamic subjects and maltreating girls.

A Muslim school that maltreated girls - imagine that!

We pause this article for a moment to look at the next segment of the The Gina Khan Interview - Part Two:

Q: Was your husband taken in by any Islamist teachings?

I had been a victim of domestic abuse and polygamy myself. The first time my husband slapped me after I questioned him he said "don't question my authority - in our religion you are not allowed. I'm your husband."

After divorce I made a promise to him that I would raise the issue of polygamy in the community and expose the consequences Muslim women silently endure, a woman would rather see her husband burn on a pyre than take on another wife. I stated that it wasn't him I was after. I was after the true kafirs - the extreme Islamists who advocate the practices that taught him that he could slap a woman across the face and take on another wife in the name of Islam. Backward practices must be erased. What happened in the 7th century or 18th century can't be continued in the 21st century. Women have a right to their full humanity as full human beings.

He wasn't a bad person; he had been forced into an arranged marriage with a cousin. Our children were ostracised from his family as a consequence of it not working out.

Polygamy destroys the soul of a woman. I knew polygamy wasn't beyond him. In any case our love story had ended. Polygamy and forced marriages destroy the lives of both men and women. Children often pay the price for broken homes and witness escalating domestic violence and oppression. The British Government hesitates in stamping it out - not wanting to instigate racial tensions; they should show some backbone because right now we are suffering.

Q: Surely local religious leaders step in and help women out, as would say a vicar or parish priest?

Not one mullah or leader of any mosque locally has ever done anything progressive for the emancipation of Muslim women, let alone help them out when they are divorced and lone mums. No one is addressing these issues seriously.

My children have been hit several times around the head in the local mosque and I was treated like an outcast - as if my stigma of being a lone mother was deserved. They wanted me to think that it was my entire fault - that I was mad not to have conformed to their ideologies. This hurt my kids - it felt like we were being punished.

"Not one mullah or leader of any mosque locally has ever done anything progressive for the emancipation of Muslim women, let alone help them out when they are divorced and lone mums."

"My children have been hit several times around the head in the local mosque".

We now continue with Glasgow Opposes Muslim School:

Although the letter, which carries the initials of Glasgow's director of education Ronnie O'Connor, is dated December 15 of last year, a source close to the council told the newspaper that the position of officials remains unchanged.

Keep in mind that that article was from October, 2006, so it refers to a letter from late 2005.

Muslims have been pressing for a state-funded Islamic school in Glasgow, which allows Roman Catholic and Jewish schools.

Education chiefs had for the past year met their calls with promises and sweet talk.

"Our education services will consult on the general principal of creating a Muslim school if a well developed proposal and widespread community support comes forward," Deputy Education Convener Gordon Matheson had said.

Misplaced

Muslim leaders in Scotland criticized officials for not coming public with their concerns.

"It's disappointing that they haven't raised these concerns with us up to now, the issue has always been one of proving the demand, which we are confident we can do," said Osama Saeed, the Scottish spokesman for the Muslim Association of Britain (MAB).

Not coming public with what concerns? That females might be "maltreated" in a Muslim school?

What would happen to any public official who might dare to suggest that? There would be cries of Islamophobia at least, if not calls for that official's death. I mean, just try drawing a cartoon about the Islamic community, and see what happens!

Opposition councilors also criticized officials for keeping their stance secret and failing to meet the needs of the Muslim minority in Scotland, estimated at some 50,000 people.

"It is wrong to keep these concerns hidden. They should be aired," said John Mason, leader of the Scottish National Party (SNP).

"I'm also uncomfortable with the idea of telling the Muslim community that it is up to them to come up with a plan."

Saeed also dismissed the officials's concerns as misplaced.

"The concerns are completely misplaced, studies of pupils from Islamic schools in England have shown that they are more tolerant and open than those not in Islamic schools," he said.

A British government study published by the Independent newspaper on October 21 found that white students are less tolerant and are a barrier to integration than their Muslim peers.

Commissioned by the Home Office, the Lancaster University study found that nearly a third of white students believed one race was superior to another.

Sure - Islamic schools are more tolerant - more progressive, perhaps?

From Teacher accuses Islamic school of racism, by Alexandra Frean, Education Editor, dated April 15, 2008:

A former teacher at an Islamic school, who alleged that it taught an offensive and racist view of non-Muslims, has been awarded £70,000 by an employment tribunal after winning his case for unfair dismissal.

Colin Cook told the tribunal in Watford that pupils were taught from Arabic books that likened Jews and Christians to "monkeys" and "pigs" at The King Fahad Academy, which is funded and run by the Saudi Arabian Government.

Saudi support for a curriculum "that likened Jews and Christians to 'monkeys' and 'pigs'." Imagine that!

The tribunal ruled that Mr Cook, a British Muslim, was unfairly dismissed from his £36,000-a-year post at the school in Acton, West London, in December 2006 after blowing the whistle on systematic cheating at a GCSE exam.

The panel found that the school created a "smokescreen" to try to justify his dismissal after 18 years' unblemished service.

It awarded Mr Cook £58,800 in compensation for loss of earnings and £10,500 for injury to feelings. But it rejected his claim that the school discriminated against him on racial grounds.

Mr Cook told the hearing that after leaving the school another member of staff gave him extracts from an Arabic textbook, which encouraged students to believe that all religions other than Islam were worthless.

The books referred to "the repugnant characteristics of the Jews". Another passage said: "Those whom God has cursed and with whom he is angry, he has turned into monkeys and pigs. They worship Satan."

Mr Cook alleged that the books were spreading race hatred. "They should not be brought into this country and they should not be used in this country," he said.

The school denied ever teaching any form of racial hatred and insisted that the offending passages in the books were "misinterpreted" and were never used in class. But it later got rid of the books.

The Religion of Peace is always "misinterpreted" and "taken out of context".

The school was established in 1985, with the aim of providing a high-quality education acceptable to the Saudi and British authorities for the children of Saudi diplomats and other Muslim families in London.

Some of the children of the jailed extremist clerics Abu Hamza al-Masri and Abu Qatada are pupils at the school, which charges fees of up to £1,500 per year for day students.

Mr Cook alleged that in June 2006 staff wrongly allowed pupils to refer to heavily annotated course books during an English language GCSE exam.

The tribunal was told that when he suggested that the school might be trying to cover up his allegations, a senior colleague told him: "This is not England. It is Saudi Arabia."

Mr Cook then took his complaints direct to the Edexcel exam board.

Mr Cook of Feltham, West London, taught English as a second language at the school. Giving evidence to the tribunal, he said that some pupils "talked as if they did not live in London at all".

Complete with oppression of women?

Next stop - honor killings? (Oh, I'm sorry - it's the UK; "honour killings".)

What was that about "a 'retrograde step'"?

When he queried how Abu Hamza and Abu Qatada could be paying school fees when they were said to be on benefits, he was told to mind his own business.

He also claimed the school was seen as an extension of the Saudi Embassy rather than part of Britain, with Saudi teachers even enjoying diplomatic immunity.

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia - our ally in the War on Terror.

Mr Cook's solicitor, Lawrence Davies, said: "Safeguards under English law were thrown out of the window when Mr Cook was sacked.

"This school must learn that it is not the Saudi way or the highway. The tribunal has upheld justice and protected the whistle-blower."

The tribunal panel was not required to rule on Mr Cook's allegations about the school's curriculum. But in its judgment, it said it had considered Mr Cook to be a "truthful witness".

As he was a respected teacher, with an 18-year unblemished record, it ruled that the impact of his dismissal had been "nothing short of life-changing" for Mr Cook. He had received a "harsh punishment for doing what he thought was the right thing to do", it concluded.

Mr Cook said last night: "I have been accused by people at the school and outside the school of lies and distortion. The school inferred that I had endangered pupils with my allegations.

"The evidence speaks otherwise. I told the truth all along. Islam teaches peace and honesty. Hopefully, my accusers will now realise that I acted justly and for the good of the school."

No one at the school was available to comment.

"Islam teaches peace and honesty."

For someone like Gina Khan, perhaps Islam is a religion of peace that teaches these things.

But, for the elite of the Arabian peninsula, Islam has always been a vehicle for conquest and imperialism.

Stay tuned to Stop Islamic Conquest as Pride of Lions continues.

Pride of Lions, Part 4

We begin by reviewing an article about some remarks that have stirred some trouble, Bishop warns of no-go zones for non-Muslims, by Jonathan Wynne-Jones, January 7, 2008:

Islamic extremists have created "no-go" areas across Britain where it is too dangerous for non-Muslims to enter, one of the Church of England's most senior bishops warns today.

The Rt Rev Michael Nazir-Ali, the Bishop of Rochester and the Church's only Asian bishop, says that people of a different race or faith face physical attack if they live or work in communities dominated by a strict Muslim ideology.

And this is exactly the situation.

The Muslim Council of Britain today described his comments as "frantic scaremongering", while William Hague, the shadow foreign secretary, said the bishop had "probably put it too strongly".

Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg said the idea of no-go areas was "a gross caricature of reality".

The Muslim Council of Britain is obviously a CAIR-like front for Islamic extremism bent on conquest of the House of War, and the British politicians have their heads stuck in the sand about a situation that they either helped create or at least don't have the guts to deal with.

Writing in The Sunday Telegraph, Bishop Nazir-Ali compares the threat to the use of intimidation by the far-Right, and says that it is becoming increasingly difficult for Christianity to be the nation's public religion in a multifaith, multicultural society.

His comments come as a poll of the General Synod - the Church's parliament - shows that its senior leaders, including bishops, also believe that Britain is being damaged by large-scale immigration.

Bishop Nazir-Ali, who was born in Pakistan, gives warning that attempts are being made to give Britain an increasingly Islamic character by introducing the call to prayer and wider use of sharia law, a legal system based on the Koran.

In an attack on the Government's response to immigration and the influx of "people of other faiths to these shores", he blames its "novel philosophy of multiculturalism" for allowing society to become deeply divided, and accuses ministers of lacking a "moral and spiritual vision".

Echoing Trevor Phillips, the chairman of the Commission for Equalities and Human Rights, who has said that the country is "sleepwalking into segregation", the bishop argues that multiculturalism has led to deep divisions.

It has actually led to deep unifications - many of those who seek the destruction of British society are now working toward the same goal, and in fact are playing from the same sheet of music.

David Davis, the shadow home secretary, has accused Muslims of promoting a kind of "voluntary apartheid" by shutting themselves in closed societies and demanding immunity from criticism.

It's "voluntary apartheid" only because the Muslims are the minority in the United Kingdom; when the Muslims become the majority, it will have a slightly different spin to it, and will be called "dhimmification".

Let's look at this "voluntary apartheid" from a different perspective.

We pick up where we left off in Part 3 reviewing The Gina Khan Interview - Part One January 9, 2008:

Q: You loved your family?

Yes, very much so. I inherited my Mum's love for Indian/Pakistani classical movies, music, saris and her respect for Bhutto in Pakistan. She shaped my thinking from an early age. The first book she gave me was about The Creation of Pakistan and Jinnah the founder.

I was closer to my father. I was subjected to a lot of 'double-talk'. On the one hand my Mum had hopes that I would study and go to University. On the other hand Dad was plotting my arranged marriage, with his extended family, to his nephew in Pakistan behind Mum's back.

I was closer to my Father but was manipulated later by him as a young teenager when Mum sent me to Pakistan for the first time on a holiday with him. The excuse they use is 'it's in our culture or in our religion' but endogamy (against British law) didn't apply to us.

Q: Endogamy - the practice of marrying within a particular social group?

I still remember the day one of my older sisters was leaving to go to Heathrow airport in the late 70s, Dad lowered his head, put the palms of his hands together and said "please keep my honour my daughter" - almost pleading.

Such were the sacrifices Muslim daughters made because of extended families and the pressure of family honour. Mum objected but she could do nothing as a man's word is meant to be sacred. It was a Muslim man's world and still is.

In the 70s, another sister who was in her twenties and has since died became a victim of polygamy. As a child I watched her being sectioned under the mental health act. Mum and Dad had arranged her marriage to a Muslim man who was a driving instructor, homeowner, respectable on the outside. Just after the birth of her second child they all discovered that he was already married. On being found out, he ran off to Holland with the secret wife and abandoned my sister and her two daughters. She fell apart. She knew she was finished in the eyes of Muslims, though we still loved her. Polygamy was the norm - and British Pakistani men hadn't abandoned the practice even though it was banned under British law.

"It was a Muslim man's world and still is."

Continuing now with Bishop warns of no-go zones for non-Muslims:

In the Synod survey, to be published this week, bishops, senior clergy and influential churchgoers said that an increasingly multi-faith society threatens the country's Christian heritage and blamed the divisions on the Government's failure to integrate immigrants into their communities.

It found that more than one in three believe that a mass influx of people of other faiths is diluting the Christian nature of Britain and only a quarter feel that they have been integrated into society.

We just saw from the Gina Khan excerpt how many Muslims in Britain are living by their own laws, in violation of established British law.

These people are citizens of the United Kingdom, and Her Majesty's Government is unable - or unwilling - to enforce British law when doing so would prevent harm and abuse on these citizens, who are - after all - subjects of Her Majesty's Government!

The overwhelming majority - 80 per cent - said that the Government has not upheld the place of religion in public life and up to 63 per cent fear that the Church will be disestablished within a generation, breaking a bond that has existed between the Church and State since the Reformation.

Calls for disestablishment have grown following research showing that attendance at Mass has overtaken the number of worshippers at Church of England Sunday services.

Bishop Nazir-Ali, whose father converted from Islam to Catholicism, was criticised by Ibrahim Mogra, of the Muslim Council of Britain. He said: "It's irresponsible for a man of his position to make these comments.

"He should accept that Britain is a multicultural society in which we are free to follow our religion at the same time as being extremely proud to be British. We wouldn't allow 'no-go' areas to happen. I smell extreme intolerance when people criticise multiculturalism without proper evidence of what has gone wrong."

What has gone wrong is quite obvious - it's multiculturalism; and Ibrahim Mogra and his Muslim Council of Britain are using it as a vehicle to conquer the British Isles (and other places).

But the Bishop's concerns are shared by other members of the General Synod.

The Bishop's concerns are shared, because the Bishop's concerns are right on the money.

The Rt Rev Nicholas Reade, the Bishop of Blackburn, which has a large Muslim community, said that it was increasingly difficult for Christians to share their faith in areas where there was a high proportion of immigrants of other faiths.

He believes that increasing pressure will be put on the Government to begin the process of disestablishment and end the preferential status given to the Church of England. "The writing is on the wall," he said.

Gordon Brown relinquished Downing Street's involvement in appointing bishops in one of his first facts as Prime Minister - a move viewed by some as a significant step towards disestablishment.

Last night, Mr Davis said: "Bishop Nazir-Ali has drawn attention to a deeply serious problem. The Government's confused and counter-productive approach risks creating a number of closed societies instead of one open, cohesive one. It generates the risk of encouraging radicalisation and creating home-grown terrorism."

"It generates the risk of"???

Look around - it's already happening!

Inayat Bunglawala, assistant secretary-general of the Muslim Council of Britain, said: "Bishop Nazir-Ali appears to be exercised by what he perceives as the decline in the influence of Christianity upon this country, but trying to frantically scaremonger about Islam and Muslims seems to us to be a rather unethical way of trying to reverse this.

"He talks about the rise of 'Islamic extremism' but fails to mention how some of the policies of our government and especially that of the United States in the Middle East over several decades now has clearly contributed to this phenomenon."

No, it's the Islamic texts and the extremist interpretations thereof that are to blame for this.

We conclude this post by concluding our review of The Gina Khan Interview - Part One:

Q: And you? You had tough times on account of not being willing to submit, though you remained a Muslim?

Yes - and events shaped me. These family events shaped my mind, my thinking. I left home early after divorce myself and became distant from Islam - but only temporarily. It's not for me to say but I think I am a good Muslim. I do not conform to outdated norms but that does not stop me from being a good Muslim in Britain today.

I have lived in a hostel, abandoned and alone, I had lost my first child and sister within a few months and post natal depression wasn't recognised in those days. Certainly nobody understood my plight as a young divorcee, stigmatised by a label, accused of dishonouring the family. Amazing really, because divorce rates are so high amongst British Muslims - the community loses so many of its "daughters" this way.

Q: As your home area became more Islamist, so did your father?

In the early 80s, my Dad was a pensioner even though I was only 13. Dad had gone to hajj when he became a pensioner and religion took over. Soon after becoming more religious, Dad started to attend the local mosques in Alum Rock, Washwood heath and Small heath. Tablighi Jamaat ran these mosques and even then in the 80s they had established quite a few prominent mosques, where only men attended.

Dad and I spent a lot of time talking as this change was occurring. It was before I was married - as I lived life as a 'caged virgin'. He would say "there will be mosques everywhere. Islam is the true religion, Islam will take over and kafirs (unbelievers) will burn in the fire of hell". In hindsight Dad was obviously being brainwashed into an ideology. He visibly changed. It's the same kind of rhetoric the West hear Islamists and Jihadists preach today. Tablighi Jamaat are part of it - I can't understand why politicians can't see this.

The can't see this because "the British politicians have their heads stuck in the sand about a situation that they either helped create or at least don't have the guts to deal with."

I was frightened and didn't question my father's beliefs. In time I saw mosque after mosque being built in my area. I witnessed the power of dynamic preachers on satellite, on tapes.

Q: Your area changed dramatically?

In the 90s, my family had sold up and moved out of Ward End. I had returned after I had married to live in Ward End. Ward End was not the same place anymore. Non Muslims were moving out as more Muslims were moving in. I recall seeing posters and flyers asking Muslims to attend meetings, I didn't understand why the Muslims suddenly hated the West or what they meant by the 'Ummah'. I and my friends were witnessing the rise of more and more young Muslim men growing beards and wearing Arabic style tunics.

Women who were once 'normal' British Asians were now wearing the black veil or head coverings. Islamic bookshops and clothes shops sprang up from nowhere. It was Islam going backwards not forwards. I used to joke that soon they will be importing camels.

Little did I realise that influence was coming from desert Islam, Wahhabism, and there were other branches too: Sunnis who adhered to Maududi's interpretation of political Islam. If I hadn't researched or educated myself into the rise of political Islam and Jihadism, I would have thought my Dad was right and extreme Islamism is the only true religion.

Numerous areas of the United Kingdom are changing dramatically.

France already has a list of "sensitive urban zones" (ATLAS DES ZONES URBAINES SENSIBLES) which are essentially no-go areas for the authorities.

Sweden has long been going this way, as well.

Western Europe is heading down the same road as the Balkans; the example is that of Kosovo and Bosnia-Herzegovina.

The difference, however, is that France and the United Kingdom are nuclear-armed permanent members of the UN Security Council.

Stay tuned to Stop Islamic Conquest as Pride of Lions continues.