Afghan on trial for Christianity

[garymorton]

Four news reports

1. from the BBC and the Globe on Afghan Man Faces Death for his Christianity.

2. On Harper’s visit to Afghanistan from http://citizensontheweb.ca political action news.

While Stephen Harper was in Afghanistan talking with Hamid Karzai, he didn’t mention to Canadians that Afghanistan is an extreme Sharia Law State and that it will be their leader Hamid Karzai who makes the final decision on executing a man caught with a Bible in Kabul.

Why are our troops propping up an Islamic State? In truth those guys are the same guys whether we call them Taliban, Warlords, Members of Parliament or our friends and enemies. What would they say if we were executing a Muslim caught worshipping?

Would Canadians want to be imprisoned and facing the gallows after being turned in by family members and caught with a Bible?

Will Harper allow MPPs to comment on this? Or will they be gagged further?

=======================================

Afghan on trial for Christianity

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4823874.stm

By Robert Pigott

BBC Religious Affairs Correspondent

Afghanistan's constitution is based on Sharia law

An Afghan man is being tried in a court in Kabul for his conversion from Islam to Christianity.

He could be sentenced to death for the act and his refusal to recant.

The trial of Abdul Rahman reflects the struggle between religious hardliners and reformists over what shape Islam will take in Afghanistan.

Mr Rahman was arrested last month after his estranged family - with whom he was in dispute over the custody of his two children - denounced him as a convert.

Mr Rahman, who is 41, was found to be carrying a Bible and was charged with rejecting Islam.

'Attack on Islam'

He acknowledged during his trial that he did convert 16 years ago while a medical aid worker with a Christian group helping Afghani refugees in Pakistan.

The prosecutor, Abdul Wasi, said he had offered to drop the charges if Mr Rahman would convert back to Islam, but he had refused to do so.

Mr Wasi said therefore that Mr Rahman must get the death penalty.

The trial judge has also described Mr Rahman's action as an attack on Islam.

A sentence of death for Mr Rahman would be a significant precedent as a conservative interpretation of the Sharia law on which Afghanistan's constitution is based.

=========================

Afghan man faces death for turning to Christianity

TIM ALBONE

From Tuesday's Globe and Mail

KABUL — The judge deciding whether an Afghan man should be executed for converting to Christianity does not understand what all the fuss is about.

"In this country, we have [a] perfect constitution. It is Islamic law and it is illegal to be a Christian and it should be punished," Judge Alhaj Ansarullah Mawawy Zada said in an interview yesterday. "In your country, two women can marry. I think that is very strange."

Judge Zada, head of Kabul's primary court, has already heard initial evidence in the case of Abdul Rahman, a 41-year-old who converted to Christianity from Islam more than 14 years ago. The judge is expected to deliver his verdict within two weeks.

Mr. Rahman converted while in Pakistan where he worked for a Christian aid agency. He was arrested after he returned to his birthplace and tried to regain custody of his daughters, who had been living with his parents. His family turned him in, and he was arrested with a Bible in his possession.

"It is a crime to convert to Christianity from Islam. He is teasing and insulting his family by converting," Judge Zada said. "The Attorney-General is emphasizing he should be hung."

If sentenced to death, Mr. Rahman has two avenues of appeal: to the Provincial Court and to the Supreme Court. The death sentence also would need President Hamid Karzai's approval to be carried out.

Prosecutor Abdul Wasi said the charge would be dropped if Mr. Rahman converted back to Islam, which he has so far refused to do.

Prison officials refused requests to interview Mr. Rahman, but one of his cellmates said he was resolute.

"He is standing by his words," said Sayad Miakel, 30. "He will not become a Muslim again."

Another cellmate said Mr. Rahman seemed depressed.

"He keeps looking up to the sky, to God," said Khalylullah Safi, 31.

The trial is believed to be the first of its kind in Afghanistan and highlights a struggle between religious conservatives and reformists over what shape Islam should take four years after the ouster from Afghanistan of the fundamentalist Taliban regime.

It also reveals the friction between Islamic and statutory law.

Both are affirmed in the country's draft constitution, which says Islam is the religion of Afghanistan but also mentions the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which ensures freedom of religion.

Afghanistan is a conservative Islamic country. About 99 per cent of its 28 million people are Muslim and the rest are mainly Hindu.

A Christian aid worker in Kabul, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter, said there is no reliable figure for the number of Christians in the country, although it is believed to be only in the dozens or low hundreds.

He said few admit their faith because of fear of retribution and there are no known Afghan churches.

An old house in a war-wrecked suburb of Kabul serves as a Christian place of worship for expatriates. From the muddy street, the building looks like any other. Its guard, Abdul Wahid, said no Afghans go there.

The only other churches are believed to be inside foreign embassies or on bases used by U.S. troops or the NATO-led peacekeeping force.

Special to The Globe and Mail, with a report from Associated Press

==================================

-Stephen Harper’s Afghan Deception http://photosc.msspro.com/citizen/afghan2.htm

-Mr. Harper’s Honeymoon in Afghanistan http://photosc.msspro.com/citizen/afghan1.htm

Mr. Harper's Honeymoon in Afghanistan - Feb.25.2006

By Gary Morton at http://CitizensontheWeb.ca

Stephen Harper found himself under attack when he first stepped into office ... or rather it was the other way around. Canadians found themselves under attack and the media retaliated to a certain extent. There was the appointment of a lobbyist to the defense post, an unelected political hack parachuted into Cabinet, and the immediate jump of Liberal David Emerson into Harper's lap.

Citizens are still campaigning and suing in regards to Emerson. It's in the news ... but what isn't in the commentary is criticism of the continued wayward drift of the Conservative Party and our federal government.

As citizen brides let's take stock of our honeymoon with Stephen. How has it gone? Well, a couple days back we got the sad news that the marriage will not be consummated. It seems the husband is in bed with Gilles Duceppe and the Conservatives will be governing arm in arm with the Bloc. Isn't that great, Gilles has come along with us on the honeymoon.

It's a hot deal, but not as hot as it is here in the honeymoon hotel in Afghanistan. Of course this was all Stephen's idea … making that first romantic trip one to Afghanistan.

Now we can show the rest of Canada via photo-ops the good things our 2,000 soldiers are doing here. If the trip is not cut short by al Qaeda terrorists Canadians will see lovely travel shots of Afghanistan and a few choice clips of those few residents and small children that have benefited from our largess and medical technology. A large majority of Canadians believe we shouldn't be in Afghanistan (62%) and this will be an opportunity to convince them that we need to be more involved in the war on terror. Maybe even in Iraq where a civil war is now underway.

What our fellow Canadians won't see is the stuff behind the cardboard cutouts. Our troops are now combat troops, working with the Americans to bring us to their side when it comes to aggression and inhumane treatment of prisoners and civilian populations. When the media shows the photo-op of that small boy being treated by our miraculous medical science, it won't show the rest of the Afghan population which has slipped to a level of poverty and child poverty equivalent to parts of Africa. No one will mention that when it comes to economic wellbeing our installed democracy performs poorer than the Taliban and Soviet occupiers did. There'll be no film of the flourishing opium crops or the mass destruction of war that has never been repaired. It won’t be noted that we are short three quarters of a billion dollars just to sustain the present Canadian Forces and have no real money to help the local population.

We will see the glories of the Afghan democracy we helped create.... and let's see ... Afghan democracy is a system where murderous warlords are members of parliament. The president over this parliament and nation is a guy name Hamid Karzai ... who can't step from his kitchen to his bathroom without being surrounded by at least fifty heavily armed bodyguards. Of course not being able to travel isn't much of a hindrance to him because his government has no power outside of Kabul.

Canada is ruling up in Kandahar ... as more or less part of the occupation combat force. That's right; our lovely troops aren't peacekeepers anymore. The idea of us being peacekeeping good guys is mostly spin. We're in the search and destroy game now ... and we are a field force of heavily armed men on a hunt for terrorists in a country where 90 percent of adult men could be classified as armed militants.

Yes the media won’t pull aside the veil, and we will be wearing ours, because in this country 99.9 percent of women are still victims of the male oppression we failed to eliminate.

But let's not forget that this is a honeymoon. We want to bring the best pictures home ... but only so we can burn them after the divorce. And the judge? Where is that judge? Whoops, it looks like Stephen got wise. He’s put Mr. Rothstein up for the appointment. Rothstein is the same fellow who approved the patenting of the Harvard Mouse and that’s bad new for the divorce. Our lawyer advises that Judge Rothstein will likely rule in favour of Stephen Harper, finding that his genetically modified penis is an enhancement that should be patented and not grounds for divorce.

It’s enough to make us cry, especially when the news of that unwanted pregnancy has just come in. Stephen is fiercely against abortion, even though the marriage is off and the child was really fathered by Gilles Duceppe. And look, here comes Stephen's Minister of Finance. Jim Flaherty is on the apron now and he's announcing that he's immediately killing off spaces for 40,000 Canadian children, because, as he says, that's what we voted for. Perhaps that child will have to be raised somewhere in the new country of Quebec.

---------

Stephen Harper's Afghan Deception - Mar.15.2006

By Gary Morton at http://CitizensontheWeb.ca

Prime Minister Stephen Harper says the debate over our 2,200 troops in Afghanistan is over, but the fact is the debate never really happened.

His visit to Kandahar shows him to be a perfect general; one so overweight that he couldn’t cut and run without being in danger of a heart attack. Yes he says we won't run but despite his assurances of Canadian goodwill the high point of his visit has been the killing of an innocent Afghan rickshaw driver by our trigger happy forces.

This year 11 Canadian soldiers have been injured in Afghanistan. Two are dead. The casualty list will grow. The US experience there shows at least 220 U.S. military personnel have perished in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Uzbekistan. Afghanistan is as dangerous as Iraq from a soldier’s perspective. Canada’s current role is in assuming a nine-month command of the international military force. The key duty is in hunting down militants. The United States is reducing its troops from 19,000 to 16,000. Our troops are trying to gain freedom of movement over a wide area as they flush out Taliban fighters.

Tinhorn Canadian troops face a deteriorating security situation with Taliban attacks up. The enemy has launched 23 suicide bombs in the past six months. Foreign and local troops, a Canadian diplomat, police and many civilians have been killed. Most foreign aid groups have left Afghanistan, viewing it as too dangerous. Kidnapping is now on the rise and contractors are targeted. Civilians face a steep increase in violent robbery. Two hundred schools have been burned or damaged and violence is expected to escalate.

Canadian soldiers patrolling in light-armoured vehicles are sure to take hits and casualties. There is no way around it when the enemy deals with rocket attacks and roadside bombs. Ever-present landmines are also a problem. Our federal government has placed our troops in Afghanistan's most hostile area. Kandahar is part of Taliban lands and the warlike residents won’t see a difference between Americans and Canadians.

Historically all wars and invasions involving Afghanistan have ended in disaster. Tribal warlords have been locked in combat for centuries. The Russians invaded in 1979, and withdrew in 1989. Now Canada may repeat history as General Rick Hillier suggests that our troops could be in Afghanistan for ten years.

They will be ten long years and Mr. Harper and his embedded reporters from the CBC and Canadian Press expect Canadians will have little to talk about or debate when the body bags come home. We’ll want to keep silent as our troops are slowly wiped out in combat.

In his latest article Eric Margolis notes that “2,100 Canadian troops have ended up in a nation in which Canada has absolutely no strategic, commercial, cultural or emotional interests.”

We have no genuine role in Afghanistan and there is already opposition from some relatives of the soldiers. The mother and aunt of a Newfoundland soldier killed in Afghanistan (Cpl. Jamie Murphy) want Canada’s role reconsidered.

NDP Leader Jack Layton points out that we have never discussed the mission on a parliamentary level. Our government doesn’t say why we are in Afghanistan.

After a poll showing a large majority of Canadians against the Afghan mission military and press spin docs struck back with statements on how Canadians need tough talk on how our military role has changed. We are search and destroy terrorist hunters and not peacekeepers and humanitarian aid people.

When the attacks began and troops began to die the press was filled with spin on how we are there to help the Afghans, provide aid and ensure world peace and security.

After a Canadian soldier was axe attacked in an Afghan village the media told us his attacker was a Taliban militant. Later we find he was a 16-year-old town boy. Trevor Greene of Vancouver was attacked in a setup that involved the whole town. While the military men were meeting town leaders in supposed peace, all the children were quietly removed so the suicide attacker could strike, crying god is great as he swung his axe.

It was an attack that made it clear that we are up against the locals and not just Taliban militants.

Harper’s point man, Peter Mckay says we would jeopardize our troops in Afghanistan if we were to discuss the issue at home. Taliban militants (most of them illiterate and far from Western media) would be emboldened. Mckay believes we have to show that we will finish what we started.

Liberal defence critic Ujjal Dosanjh wants parliamentarians as representatives of Canadians to stand up in the House and provide a compelling rationale for why we're there.

Why we are there is still a big question. We thought we were peacekeepers, but peacemaking has changed to a war on terror Canadians have not approved. The attacks of September 11th are now named by Harper as a reason for killing local people in remote areas of Afghanistan.

The PR offensive to win approval of our role is to come from government, embedded reporters and the soldiers themselves. It is already underway and soon returning vets will hit the media circuit local to national to win support for the Afghan mission. This PR effort will not mention real conditions in Afghanistan. It won’t speak of a place with a shattered economy where 24 million people are totally dependent on foreign aid. It won’t inform us that opium poppy cultivation is the largest industry to redevelop since the West invaded.

Our troops are battling and imprisoning men who say they have seen nothing from the Kabul government of Hamid Karzai. They say that the new government ministries do nothing. They speak of four years with no real change. Afghanistan’s status as poorest of the poor is not changing.

The Taliban and many locals believe America is there to destroy their country and that Canada is part of the mission. We are helping to impose U.S. rule and guard routes for planned oil pipelines. They want an Islamic government and in the end they are sure to get it. The West’s tenuous control of a collection of fiefdoms run by cruel local warlords won’t hold and neither will the reign of a government that holds no real power outside of Kabul.

Perhaps Stephen Harper is correct when he says the debate over involvement in Afghanistan is over. We’ve made a whopper of a mistake and our government is going to hold us to it. The only prize for us in Afghanistan is body bags and we’ve already won some of it.

---------

[geoffrey]

This has just proven to me further that issues shouldn't neccessarily be based on majority opinion.

Afghanistan used to be a centre for Sharia law. We are working on ending the oppression of women, little girls are now allowed to go to school.

That's enough motivation for me.

[Wilber]

When you cut and pasted from this article you omitted this bit.

"The BBC's Mike Donkin in Kabul says reformists, like the government under President Hamid Karzai, want a more liberal, secular legal system but under the present constitution it is hard for them to intervene.

Precedent

The Afghan Human Rights Commission has called for a better balance in the judiciary, with fewer judges advocating Sharia law and more judges with a wider legal background.

Several journalists have been prosecuted under blasphemy laws in post-Taleban Afghanistan.

The editor of a women's rights magazine was convicted of insulting Islam and sentenced to death last year - but was later released after an apology and heavy international pressure.

Mr Karzai's office says the president will not intervene in the case.

Observers say executing a converted Christian would be a significant precedent as a conservative interpretation of Sharia law in Afghanistan.

But it would also outrage Western nations which put Mr Karzai in power and are pouring billions of dollars into supporting the country"

Would Afghanistan have a Human Rights Commission if western troops weren't there?

Would Afghanistan have a womens rights magazine it western troops weren't there?

Few would argue that Afghanistan doesn't have a long way to go but change doesn't happen overnight anywhere. It wasn't so long ago in Canada that women were the legal property of their husbands. Do we walk away and leave those trying to promote change to the jackals?

[FTA Lawyer]

When you cut and pasted from this article you omitted this bit.

"The BBC's Mike Donkin in Kabul says reformists, like the government under President Hamid Karzai, want a more liberal, secular legal system but under the present constitution it is hard for them to intervene.

Precedent

The Afghan Human Rights Commission has called for a better balance in the judiciary, with fewer judges advocating Sharia law and more judges with a wider legal background.

Several journalists have been prosecuted under blasphemy laws in post-Taleban Afghanistan.

The editor of a women's rights magazine was convicted of insulting Islam and sentenced to death last year - but was later released after an apology and heavy international pressure.

Mr Karzai's office says the president will not intervene in the case.

Observers say executing a converted Christian would be a significant precedent as a conservative interpretation of Sharia law in Afghanistan.

But it would also outrage Western nations which put Mr Karzai in power and are pouring billions of dollars into supporting the country"

Would Afghanistan have a Human Rights Commission if western troops weren't there?

Would Afghanistan have a womens rights magazine it western troops weren't there?

Few would argue that Afghanistan doesn't have a long way to go but change doesn't happen overnight anywhere. It wasn't so long ago in Canada that women were the legal property of their husbands. Do we walk away and leave those trying to promote change to the jackals?

Well said, Wilber.

FTA

[Army Guy]

Gary morton:

Now here is a guy with alot to say, perhaps you can give us the short version on just what your trying piont is. You don't like the Harper government ? You don't like the Afgan mission ? you don't like the military ?

Have you been to Afganistan,and seen the progress this nation has made in just 5 years. Have you actually been on patrol with Canadian troops down town Kanadar. Just what do you base your comments on " the shooting of a ricksaw driver by trigger happy troops" Here say or fact. And i'm curious what kind of web site is the citizens on the web toronto news.

[Montgomery Burns]

Gary Morton, please make your copy-and-pastes shorter. Not only are longwinded copy and paste jobs against forums rules, but it's hard to get motivated to read a book-sized chapter.

Anyways, it appears that the Afghanis are looking for a face-saving way out of this because of the attention this has been getting worldwide:

An Afghan man facing a possible death penalty for converting from Islam to Christianity may be mentally unfit to stand trial, a state prosecutor said Wednesday. Abdul Rahman, 41, has been charged with rejecting Islam, a crime under this country's Islamic laws. His trial started last week and he confessed to becoming a Christian 16 years ago. If convicted, he could be executed. But prosecutor Sarinwal Zamari said questions have been raised about his mental fitness.

"We think he could be mad. He is not a normal person. He doesn't talk like a normal person," he told The Associated Press. Moayuddin Baluch, a religious adviser to President Hamid Karzai, said Rahman would undergo a psychological examination.

"Doctors must examine him," he said. "If he is mentally unfit, definitely Islam has no claim to punish him. He must be forgiven. The case must be dropped."

That being said, it is disgusting charges like this that make so many think that Islam is a backward stone-age religion.

Edited to add the link I forgot to post.

Edited March 23, 2006 by Montgomery Burns

[daddyhominum]

Sharia law clearly demands execution for apostasy for males but women seem to have more leeway.

Interestingly, the site, http://muslim-canada.org/apostasy.htm, displays an article by Syed Mumtaz Ali, (who was involved in the lobby for sharia based dispute resolution) that finds a basis or an agreement with this particular law in the laws of Canada.

<begin quote>

(2) The Canadian Charter of Rights (Section 1) also requires that any reasonable limits on the guarantees of the Charter have to be demonstrably justified. It is our position that in view of the above arguments that the limits prescribed by Islamic law, with regards to blasphemy/apostasy, do satisfy both the Charter requirements. Namely (i) the Islamic limits are reasonable limits, and are (ii) demonstrably justified within the meaning of Section 1 of the Charter on these grounds: a) The provision of the Preamble regarding the Supremacy of God, the constitutional obligation to interpreted in a manner consistent with the preservation and enhancement of the multicultural heritage of Canadians, c) that over one billion people (Muslims) worldwide consider those limits to the freedom of speech/expression to be reasonable, d)(i)what such a large segment of the Canadian minority believes as a precept of their faith/religion ought to be fully recognized if the Charter's provision respecting freedom of religion are to have any real meaning. (ii) Adherence to Islamic principles in this context, ought to be accepted as sufficient enough to satisfy the Charter Requirement of demonstrable justification. Recognition of Islamic standards of reasonable limits on the freedom of speech by the Canadian courts does not necessarily entail any obligation to enforce the Islamic punishment for blasphemy/apostasy within the Canadian jurisdiction. The Muslims themselves (with the exception of the small Shi'ite minority) do not generally believe or insist on any extraterritorial rights to enforce Islamic Hadd punishment in non-Islamic countries. (See footnote 1, under II, Abingdon Dictionary of Living Religions).

<end quote>

It is an interesting argument that the reference to God in the Charter of Rights provides a source of restriction on freedom of thought and belief that can culminate in justifying the death of a man who denies Islam and switches to another belief.

While the article states that the application of Sharia, by executing an apostate, cannot be enforced in a non-muslim country, the argument is made that the laws of Canada do support such a requirement by referring to the supremacy of god as over-riding the charter.

I have to agree with the argument. If God's law is superior to the charter, as the preamble to the Charter clearly states, and where God in the Koran has clearly required the execution of apostates, there is a clear duty under the Charter provisions to execute apostates as God has required, and as the Charter agrees.

As the Charter does not bother to define God, it must be up to the reader, or to lawyers, or believers, to determine just what represents the mind of God.

Perhaps, there would be some wisdom in completely separating our politics from God.

As it now stands, a man apostate from Islam in Canada could be not be charged because no Canadian law exists for that purpose, but the Charter would not prevent the passage of such a law.

[Durgan]

Why bother getting involved? The world is full of religious nuts, simply leave them in peace. The next world is more important to them than this one.

The Romam Catholic Church used to burn people at the stake for the same crime, apostacy. It took several centuries to wipe out the practice.

Let us bring the the Afghan's a puppet, submissive government in the guise of Democracy and take the resources we want and get on with living.

Durgan.

[seabee]

daddyhominum makes very interesting point.

The part about the "supremacy of God" in the 1982 constitution has always been a time bomb.