Mauritanian Muslim Sentenced To Death For Apostasy/Blasphemy

You don't hear much about Mauritania, the West African former French colony. It's a piss-poor Islamic Republic led by a military junta,that still allows slavery (though now illegal). Other abuses include:

-discrimination against its black population and women.
-child labor
-female genital mutilation (FGM).
-child marriage
-leblouh, the force feeding of young girls to make them obese- a sign of beauty and wealth.

And they love their sharia. They have sentenced a Muslim 30-year-old man, Mohamed Cheikh Ould Mohamed, to death for apostasy, although it sounds more like blasphemy.

Mohamed has been detained since January 2 and pleaded not guilty to the charge when proceedings opened on Tuesday.

Mauritania has the death penalty but has not executed anyone since 1987, according to human rights organisation Amnesty International.

During the hearing the judge told Mohamed that he was accused of apostasy "for speaking lightly of the Prophet Mohammed" in an article which was published briefly on Mauritanian websites. In it he challenged some of the prophet's actions, the source told AFP.

Mohamed explained that it was "not his intention to harm the prophet", the source added.

His lawyer asked for leniency as he said his client was repentant but the judge agreed to the prosecutor's request for the death penalty.

Although it is said they rarely enforce strict punishments like death or floggings- and one can only hope it's the case with Mohamed- he's still going to rot in jail for the rest of his life for nothing.

More here.

Christian Woman Meriam Ibrahim Re-Arrested In Sudan After Being Released

Was amazed to read in the paper this morning that Meriam Ibrahim, the Sudanese Christian woman who was sentenced to death for apostasy, had been released.  World outrage usually relegates victims of barbaric Shariah law to years languishing in jail, like Asia Bibi, the Christian Pakistani woman who was imprisoned in 2010 after being sentenced to death for blasphemy.

It turns out Ibrahim was re-arrested at the Khartoum airport along with the rest of her family.

About 40 security agents detained Mrs Ibrahim - along with her husband, Daniel Wani and two children - at the airport, the sources said.

A top Sudanese official has told the BBC she would be freed "soon".

Abdullahi Alzareg from the ministry of foreign affairs told the BBC's Newshour programme that Mrs Ibrahim had been arrested because she did not have the correct travel documents.

Although she is Sudanese, she was using emergency South Sudanese papers with a US visa, he said.

She would be asked to get a passport and exit visa on her release, he added.

It appears the National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) was not happy with the appeal court's decision.


The rest here.

"Execute her" Demands Brother Of Sudanese Christian Convert

It appears the Sudanese woman who has been sentenced to death for apostasy was turned in by her own brother who believes she "should be executed" if she doesn't convert back to Islam.

Al-Samani al-Hadi told CNN that he handed his sister over to the authorities because his family are “Muslim people,” and that she should “repent.”

“It's one of two; if she repents and returns to our Islamic faith and to the embrace of our family then we are her family and she is ours,” he said.

“But if she refuses she should be executed,” he said.

Meriam Yehya Ibrahim was born to an Ethiopian Orthodox Christian mum and a Sudanese Muslim father. After the dad abandoned the family, Meriam was raised as a Christian. She is also married to a southern Sudanese Christian man who happens to be a U.S. citizen.

Proving just how unfair Islam is, Muslim men are allowed to marry women of any faith, on the other hand Muslim woman are only allowed to marry Muslims.

Response from the U.S. State Department: "deeply disturbed."

Christian Sudanese Woman Sentenced To Death For Apostasy

27-year-old Meriam Yehya Ibrahim was raised a Christian, but because her father (who abandoned the family when Meriam was a kid) happens to be Muslim, she is considered a Muslim as well. Meriam, who is 8 months pregnant and married to a Christian, has now been convicted of adultery and apostasy, and was sentenced to death by a Sudanese court. She's to get 100 lashes for good measure, for the adultery.

Ibrahim's lawyer Haram Othman told CNN that her legal team will appeal the verdict within 15 days.

According to the rights group Amnesty International, she was convicted of adultery because her marriage to a Christian man was considered void under Sharia law. She was sentenced to 100 lashes for the second crime.

"The verdict is contrary to commitments Sudan has made in its own Constitution and commitments made under regional and international law; Meriam has been convicted solely on account of her religious convictions and personal status," said Katherine Perks with the African Centre for Justice and Peace Studies.

"The fact that a woman could be sentenced to death for her religious choice, and to flogging for being married to a man of an allegedly different religion, is abhorrent and should never be even considered," Manar Idriss, Amnesty International's Sudan researcher, said in a statement.

" 'Adultery' and 'apostasy' are acts which should not be considered crimes at all, let alone meet the international standard of 'most serious crimes' in relation to the death penalty. It is a flagrant breach of international human rights law," the researcher said.

Ibrahim is eight months pregnant and is in custody with her 20-month-old son, according to Amnesty International, which considers her a prisoner of conscience.

This is Islam and Sharia for you.

More here.

Homosexuals To Be Stoned To Death In Brunei

Brunei has just taken a giant step back into the dark ages. The death penalty, by stoning, will now be meted out for the following offenses:

Homosexuality, sodomy, adultery, extramarital relations for Muslims, blasphemy (defaming Mohammed), apostasy, along with rape, murder and robbery.

The United Nations Commission on Human Rights is "concerned."

"We are deeply concerned about the revised penal code in Brunei Darussalam, due to come into force later this month, which stipulates the death penalty for numerous offences," said Rupert Colville, spokesman for the UN high commissioner for human rights.

"Application of the death penalty for such a broad range of offences contravenes international law," Colville said.

Although no-one has been executed since 1957, the current sultan of Brunei, Hassanal Bolkiah, wants to institute harsh Islamic Shariah law as the law of the land, which allows for death by stoning. Homosexuality, which is illegal in the country, could get you 10 years in jail, that will change on April 22.

Source: Opposing Views.

It's all very interesting considering some of the Sultan's family members have a not so Islamically stellar reputation. Mansions, jets, harems full of prostitutes, jets and other excesses.

Legalized Marital Rape and Child Marriage Part Of Proposed Iraqi Law

It appears we wasted a heck of a lot of precious U.S. blood in Iraq. Not only has the country continued to be a hotbed of sectarian violence after US troop withdrawl, it's now considering passing a barbaric law that will set women back centuries, and rights activists are hopping mad. 

The current legal age to get married there is 18. With the okay from your parents you can marry at 15. That will all change if the Jaafari Personal Status Law (named for the sixth Shiite imam Jaafar al-Sadiq) is introduced.  Although it does not specifically mention a minimum age that girls can marry, it does refer to a specific age in the "divorce" section. The age of Mohammed's child bride Aisha- 9.

.. setting rules for divorces of girls who have reached the age of 9 years in the lunar Islamic calendar. It also says that's the age girls reach puberty.

Since the Islamic calendar year is 10 or 11 days shorter than the Gregorian calendar, that would be the equivalent of 8 years and 8 months old.

Other parts of the bill that encourage male-domination:

Men will have all the control when it comes to marriage proposals for their daughters.

Men will have all control over their wives when it comes to sexual relations. Raping wives will be legal.

Women will need permission from their husbands to leave their homes.

Women will have fewer rights when it comes to post-divorce child custody.

Men will have an easier time taking on more wives.

The bill is apparently catering to the majority Shiites who were persecuted under Saddam Hussein's reign of terror, and some believe tied to the upcoming elections.

Baghdad-based analyst Hadi Jalo suggested that election campaigning might be behind the proposal.

''Some influential Shiite politicians have the impression that they should do their best to make any achievement that would end the injustice that had been done against the Shiites in the past,'' Jalo said.

Naturally, Sunni females aren't too happy about the proposal.

.. lawmaker Likaa Wardi believes it violates women's and children's rights and creates divisions in society.

''The Jaffari law will pave the way to the establishments of courts for Shiites only, and this will force others sects to form their own courts. This move will widen the rift among the Iraqi people,'' Wardi said.

Secular Shiites are just as opposed.

Qais Raheem, a Shiite government employee living in eastern Baghdad, said the draft bill contradicts the principles of a modern society.

''The government officials have come up with this backward law instead of combating corruption and terrorism,'' said Raheem who has four children, including two teenage girls.

''This law legalises the rape and we should all reject it.''

Hopefully they will reject it, but who knows.