The First Muslim Member Of Congress On His Faith Journey

By Brooke Obie, Contributing Editor, EBONY.com

In 2006, U.S. Congressman Keith Ellison was elected to represent Minnesota’s 5th district, becoming the state’s first African American representative and the first Muslim to serve in Congress.

To both praise and controversy, Ellison was sworn into office on a copy of the Qur’an once owned by Thomas Jefferson, a reminder of the religious tolerance the nation was founded upon. Ellison’s faith journey was founded on that same principle.

Raised by devout Catholic parents, Ellison, the third of five sons, remembers respect, tolerance and social justice being constant topics in his household, and he was given the right to choose his path at a young age.  As a kid, when Ellison became disinterested in Catholicism, seeing the faith as “just rules and regulations, orthodox dogma,” he stopped attending services. 

“I think I was an atheist or agnostic at some point, as well,” he tells EBONY.com.

It wasn’t until his sophomore year of college at Wayne State University that a 19-year-old Ellison made a true connection with Islam and chose the faith for himself.

“I was studying for a calculus test with a friend of mine from Libya when he said he had to leave and go to Jum’ah and I asked, ‘What’s that?’ He thought I should come and see for myself.  I was curious, so I went with him and I saw all these shoes out in the hallway in the student center at Wayne State and men and women were sitting in there on sheets and there was a speaker talking about things that were interesting to me. I was working on anti-apartheid activities at the time and I was active on racial justice and fairness issues, so I liked what the speaker was saying. I went back the week after that and started reading more on the Qur’an and started reading other books on Islam.”

As Ellison’s interest grew, he sought out a deeper connection to the Muslim community off-campus.  “I was driving on the highway in one of the major arteries in Detroit called Davidson and saw a sign that said ‘Muslim Center.’  I met the guys at the Davidson Muslim Center and they welcomed me in. After going there for a month, I took the Shahada, which is the first pillar of Islam, ‘There is no god but God, and Mohammed is his messenger.’ (s) It was Islam’s message of social justice and equality that affected me the most and satisfied my spiritual yearning and wondering about God, man, nature, and humanity.”

Though his family was initially surprised by his conversion to Islam, Ellison, who has a Baptist minister for a brother, says his family has “always been pretty accepting.” Ellison took that example with him as he started his own family with former wife, high school sweetheart Kim Ellison, who was not a Muslim, though their four children were raised in the faith. Respect and humility, he says, are key in healing the divide that differences in religion can create between loved ones, especially concerning the afterlife.

“While there are corporal descriptions of what the afterlife is like in Christianity, Islam and Judaism, what’s going on there is the finite trying to describe the infinite. If God knows everything, started everything and is the only one who knows how it’s going to end, how can any human know what God wants?

“I believe that scriptures give us insight. You approach faith with humility. You can have some idea but it boils down to: Do you see religion as a club or do you see religion as a path? Do you see it as a wall that separates you or do you see it as a bridge that connects you to God and other people? When you see it as a bridge, you aren’t so worried about bringing others over to your side.”

When confronted with members of his faith who do not share this view, Ellison says, “I try to remind people of what the Book says. I try to talk about the tolerance of Mohammed. I do not believe that it’s proper or right to impose my religion in any way and in the Qur’an it specifically says not to impose religion [e.g. “You shall have your religion and I shall have my religion”]. There are things that I don’t partake in. I don’t drink, I don’t gamble, because Islam says not to, but for those who want to, that’s their choice.

“Whatever religion [people] profess and what their religion says to do are often very divergent. People will politicize religion; we see it in every faith, in every religion. We see it with Pat Robertson, in my opinion, and we see it with the Taliban.

“People appropriate religious beliefs and advance their own agenda. People get turned off by that and may become atheists, but Stalin was an atheist. So the real question isn’t religion or not religion or which religion, it’s: Are you willing to kill people or deprive people of freedom in order to force religion upon them?”

Ellison’s support for freedom of choice extends well beyond religion.  Motivated by his faith, the co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus has been at the forefront of human and civil rights issues, consistently voting pro-choice and most recently co-sponsoring legislation to protect the voting rights of the disenfranchised.

“I try to live tolerance in my own way, which is why, as a politician one of my key priorities is to stand up for human rights. So, you’ll find me working on racial justice, gender justice, immigration and LGBT issues.

“Some Muslims wonder why I work for LGBT rights, but it’s not for us to judge people. We trust God to decide what’s right and what’s right. So, yeah, I do find people in Islam who are intolerant and sometimes even violently so, but ultimately our purpose is to demonstrate tolerance, live it, show it, and speak up for it.”

Brooke Obie writes the column, “The Spiritual Life,” and is an EBONY.com contributing editor. Follow her on Twitter @BrookeObie.

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By Deepa Seetharaman

DETROIT (Reuters) – Every Wednesday, Ford Motor Co’s <F.N> top executives gather before sunrise to work through some of the company’s most vexing problems. Notably absent is Chief Executive Alan Mulally.

The 2-1/2-hour meetings, which mainly focus on vehicle quality issues, were started by Mark Fields after he was appointed chief operating officer a year ago – a clear sign that a changing of the guard is under way at the No. 2 U.S. automaker.

Mulally, 68, is a top contender to lead Microsoft Corp <MSFT.O>, according to sources familiar with the software company. But regardless of whether he gets that job, he is unlikely to stay at Ford through 2014, two people close to the automaker said.

The view from inside Ford, and of people close to the company, is that the management team Mulally groomed is now ready for his exit. Fields, 52, is widely expected to take over as CEO.
“Collectively we have helped change the culture – it’s not just relegated to one particular individual,” Fields told reporters in September. “It’s really about all of us looking to build on the things over the years that have made our culture so strong.”

After more than seven years at Ford’s helm, Mulally is closely identified with the company’s ability to avoid the 2009 federal bailouts needed to save General Motors Co <GM.N> and Chrysler, now controlled by Fiat Spa <FIA.MI>.

The Kansas native’s “One Ford” strategy connected Ford’s once-disparate business units to achieve economies of scale and boost profit. He also overhauled Ford’s once-toxic culture to create one based on collaboration and disclosure.

Yet the challenges ahead for Ford are still significant, analysts said. The company’s premium brand, Lincoln, is struggling. Quality problems in North America have knocked the Ford brand to near the bottom of reliability surveys from Consumer Reports and J.D. Power & Associates. Ford also is still catching up to rivals in Asia.

The overriding question is how Ford will fare without the architect of its turnaround. A key concern is preventing Ford’s old culture from resurfacing after Mulally is gone.

“When the alpha goes away, does the new alpha step up?” Guggenheim Securities analyst Matthew Stover asked. “We won’t know until that happens.”

Ford has repeatedly said Mulally plans to stay as CEO through the end of 2014. This timetable was announced late last year as were several executive changes, including Fields’ promotion to COO and the appointment of Joe Hinrichs to head the Americas.

FORD ‘LIFERS’ POISED TO LEAD

Mulally’s exit would leave Ford mostly in the hands of “lifers” who have spent much of their careers working for the Blue Oval. All but one corporate officer – global marketing chief Jim Farley – were at Ford prior to Mulally.

Most of them rose through the ranks during the 1990s and early 2000s – when the corporate atmosphere had “more intrigue than Czarist Russia,” Ford Chairman Bill Ford, the great-grandson of company founder Henry Ford, once said.

Engineers and designers waited until the last possible moment to reveal problems in hopes of avoiding blame for delays in new car launches. Executives tapped each others’ phones and covertly tried to undermine one another, according to “American Icon,” a 2012 book by Bryce Hoffman about Mulally’s battle to turn around Ford.

In September 2005, then-CEO Bill Ford tapped Fields to staunch mounting losses in North America. Fields devised a restructuring plan dubbed the “Way Forward,” but it did not go far enough.

Ford lost $12.7 billion in 2006, the year Mulally was hired from Boeing Co <BA.N> by Bill Ford, who stepped aside as CEO but retained the title of chairman.

Mulally instituted a Thursday morning meeting to review all aspects of the business, and pressed executives to air problems openly. These business plan reviews, or BPRs, are often cited as the reason for Ford’s cultural transformation.

“We spend a lot of time together,” said Chief Financial Officer Bob Shanks, who has been at Ford for 36 years. “You really can’t hide in your room like I think the old days … (when) you rarely had to see people other than to go into the arena and joust.”

Under Mulally’s tenure, Ford’s share price has roughly doubled to $16.59 as of Friday’s close. In comparison, the broad Standard & Poor’s 500 Index <.SPX> rose about 36 percent over that period.

FORGING A BOND IN BAD TIMES

Ford announced last year that the BPRs would now be run by Fields, another sign that he was being tested as Mulally’s heir. Mulally still attends those meetings.

In the past, investors have questioned whether Fields – who joined Ford about 24 years ago after Harvard Business School – can build on Mulally’s successes and sustain his culture changes.

Ford executives point out that it was in the crucible of Fields’ “Way Forward” that the current senior leaders began to develop their rapport. Fields’ attempted cultural overhaul took shape during fast-paced daily meetings at the company’s product development center in Dearborn, Michigan. Executives who worked on the “Way Forward” and a later effort to accelerate that plan describe the room as “a hole.”

But over cold sandwiches and salads at lunch, senior leaders – including Fields, Hinrichs, Shanks, global product development chief Raj Nair and incoming global design chief Moray Callum – began to forge a bond.

Sometimes they discussed new models, sometimes TV’s “American Idol.” The idea to delay the Lincoln Town Car’s demise by shifting production to Canada sprung from these lunches. In the fall of 2006, they briefed each other on the new CEO, Alan Mulally.

“We’d see each other almost every day at lunch time and that was kind of our unstructured (time),” said Hinrichs, who joined Ford 13 years ago. “There was a lot of camaraderie that came from collectively the group working through the Way Forward stuff every day, the Way Forward Acceleration stuff every day and rebuilding the North American business.”

DIRECTORS KEEN TO END LIMBO

A smooth handover from Mulally to Fields would be a milestone for a company that has rarely had a routine CEO transition in its more than 110-year history. Mulally is Ford’s third-longest-serving CEO, after founder Henry Ford and his grandson Henry Ford II.

Last year, Mulally was in talks about a role in the Obama administration, but ultimately committed to two more years as Ford’s CEO.

Speculation that Mulally could become the next CEO of Microsoft has overshadowed other Ford news for months. The limbo at Ford contrasts with GM, which said last week that Mary Barra would succeed Dan Akerson as CEO.

Some Ford directors are now keen for a resolution, especially as the automaker prepares for its biggest new vehicle launch year in history, including an all-new Mustang sports car and a radical overhaul of its most profitable vehicle, the F-150 pickup truck.

“We have skilled leaders at every position, a strong bench of succession plans and I think that’s why you’re seeing Ford continue to deliver profitable growth,” Mulally said in a recent interview. He declined to discuss exit plans.

People close to Ford say younger, newly promoted executives have been making their mark on the company over the last year, tackling top issues such as improving quality.

After his promotion to COO last year, Fields put in place a meeting every Wednesday at 6:30 a.m. Called “special attention reviews,” they are for executives to go over Ford’s more than 60 global vehicle programs and dive deeply into the ones in the most trouble.

Ford has since revamped the way it launches new models, so that engineering, design and purchasing teams work together more closely from the start. Executives say the tenor and results of Fields’ meetings are an example of how Mulally’s culture is baked in to the company.

“It was a way for us to prove to ourselves, more than anything else, that the lessons learned in terms of how we’ve worked together – we can work without Alan being in the room,” said Hau Thai-Tang, recently appointed global purchasing chief, who has been with Ford for 25 years. “It’s ingrained in the Ford culture.”

(Additional reporting by Allison Martell in Toronto and Bernie Woodall in Detroit; editing by Tiffany Wu and Matthew Lewis)

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By Lamine Chikhi

ALGIERS (Reuters) – Eight months after Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika suffered a debilitating stroke, his allies are promoting constitutional changes including a new vice presidency, which may let the ageing independence veteran run for a fourth term.

That would put off an answer to one of the enduring questions in North Africa: who will replace Bouteflika, 76, as leader of one of the principle allies of the West against Islamist militancy.

Bouteflika has ruled Algeria since 1999, credited by his supporters with drawing the country out of a civil war that killed 200,000 people, and restoring civilian rule in a major OPEC oil and gas supplier to Europe.

He has been silent on whether he will seek a fourth term and rarely seen in public since returning from treatment in France in July. Detailed questions about the state of his health have gone mostly unanswered.

In April he suggested it was time for the old guard to move aside for new leaders: “Our generation is over.”

But Algeria’s ruling FLN party has nevertheless touted him for weeks as their official candidate, and his allies have started outmaneuvering rivals in negotiations between FLN cadres and military elites who wield real power.

Rivalry between the military and civilians for behind-the-scenes influence has been a central feature of Algerian political life since independence. During the 1990s, the military seized power after Islamists were poised to win a presidential election, leading to civil war.

Bouteflika may believe he still needs a fourth term to guarantee political changes that leave civilians, not generals, in charge, an FLN source told Reuters, explaining the president’s thinking.

A proposed a package of constitutional reforms is being interpreted as a signal of his intention to run again. The details of the reform package have not been fully disclosed, but Bouteflika’s allies say it will contain clauses that limit the army’s role in politics.

Among the other changes, adding a new post of vice president would allow Bouteflika to run again despite his health, and possibly make the question of succession less cloudy.

“If Bouteflika is recovering from a stroke and really wants to run for a fourth term, he will definitely need a vice president to back him and probably campaign on his behalf,” said Nouredine Boukrouh, a former Bouteflika minister.

“The new constitution will include the position of a vice president to allow Bouteflika continue to rule, so that if his condition deteriorates, the vice president will do the job.”

Eurasia Group analyst Riccardo Fabiani agreed that without a the creation of a vice presidency, the president would probably be unable to run again, while his health “remains a wild card”.

It would not be the first time the Algerian constitution was rejigged before an election to let Bouteflika run again. In 2008, Algerian lawmakers lifted presidential term limits, a measure criticized by opposition parties as an attempt to keep Bouteflika in power. He won a third five-year term in 2009.

The new package of reforms is likely to restore limits of two five-year terms for future presidents, although this restriction would not apply to Bouteflika.

Restoring term limits “would be a signal that we are going in the right direction, in the direction of democracy,” a political leader who participated in talks with the government over constitutional changes told Reuters.

The proposed constitutional reform package is still with the president’s office. If he pushes it forward it would go to parliament, where the FLN and its allies hold a majority.

Some opponents are angry at the attempt to change the rules: “We are against amending the constitution before the 2014 presidential election,” said Djilali Sofiane, leader of a new party called Jil Jadid. “It will pave the way for the president to get a fourth term.”

However, others may not complain too vociferously. Mohamed Ferrad, a senior member of an anti-Bouteflika group that includes 14 opposition parties and political leaders, said the opposition was not opposed to Bouteflika running for another term, although he should publish his medical records first.

“What Bouteflika wants above all, and what he shares with other decision-makers even if they are opposed to his policies, is stability,” said Geoff Porter, president of North African Risk Consulting.
“Bouteflika has long complained that he is a three-quarters president and he needs the office of the vice presidency in order to fully realize the potential of the executive.”

ARMY VS. CIVILIANS

After the end of Algeria’s war, Bouteflika restored civilian rule in principle, but he has never succeeded in curbing the influence of generals, especially the DRS military intelligence service and its powerful chief, General Mohamed Mediene.

Bouteflika’s allies say that, by limiting the army’s role in politics, the constitutional reforms would strengthen the president’s hand in a fourth term.

The constitutional changes have won the backing of other parties and powerful unions, part of a push widely interpreted as a sign he is considering standing for another term.

Algerians expect the decision of whether he will run again and the name of any vice presidential running mate will emerge from behind-the-scenes dealmaking by shadowy figures popularly referred to as “Le Pouvoir” – “the power” – consisting of FLN party leaders and security services bosses.

If that is the case, Bouteflika seems to be making moves that would strengthen his position.

This year he reshuffled his cabinet to bolster allies. Security sources say he also shifted some responsibilities from the DRS security service to the regular army to curtail the influence of Mediene.

The question of succession in Algeria is closely watched by its neighbors and by Western powers who see the large North African oil and gas producer as a key partner in the war against Islamist militants in the Maghreb.

Bouteflika has already delegated some responsibilities to his premier Abdelmalek Sellal, seen as a potential running mate.

“I can tell you he is healthy and we will see him just now,” Sellal said when asked about Bouteflika’s health. “If he wants to pursue his mission, he will decide on his conscience.”

The succession is not likely to be resolved in the streets as it was during the 2011 “Arab Spring” revolts in Tunisia, Libya, Egypt and Yemen. Algerians did not rise up as their neighbors did, although the country has seen protests over jobs and living standards. Instead, the political future is likely to be resolved through negotiation among powerful insiders.

With around $200 billion of reserves from energy sales, the government has cash to ward off any unrest at home. Opposition parties are weak and Algerians have no appetite for upheaval after their bloody civil war.

Investors will be keen to see how the next government opens up more after years of centralized state control, and how it makes deals with more lucrative terms for foreign oil players.

If Bouteflika doesn’t run, then it is still unclear whether the DRS could seek to impose its own candidate. With its powers curbed, the DRS may be no longer be able to block Bouteflika, and, said one state security source, may even support him.

“There is no doubt that the DRS will support Bouteflika no matter what decision he will take because at the end of the day it will keep within the law,” the source said.

But Eurasia’s Fabiani said the DRS chief may seek to push back against the Bouteflika clan to “establish a level playing field” and seek a compromise candidate.

(Writing by Patrick Markey; Editing by Peter Graff)

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By Karin Friedemann, TMO

Ibragim Todashev and his wife Reniya Manukyan. Photograph: family handout

Florida State Attorney Jeffrey Ashton met with US Department of Justice officials last week to discuss their investigations into the killing of Ibragim Todashev in his home at 6022 Peregrine Ave in Orlando, Florida in the wee hours of May 22, 2013.

The Associated Press reported last week that DoJ had finished a preliminary report into Todashev’s killing, but it has not been released to the public.

Ashton reportedly received “additional investigative material” from Justice officials and requested more information. The Department of Justice oversees the FBI, which typically clears the agents involved in extra-judicial murders. According to the New York Times, FBI agents shot and killed about 70 subjects and wounded 80 others between 1993 and 2011. In each case, an investigation concluded that the shooting was justified.

“The FBI wouldn’t go on record with an official version of events, and was unusually tight-lipped about the case, even as the dead man’s grieving father speculated that his son was murdered,” reports Conor Friedersdorf in the Atlantic.

“The State Attorney and his staff will diligently continue their investigation into the death of Ibragim Todashev with the expectation of concluding the investigation and making the findings public in early 2014,” said Ashton’s spokesman, Richard Walsh.

This is disappointing since what the public really wants to know now is the names of the officers involved so that they can be prosecuted, not that the matter be quietly concluded. Ashton’s office is supposed to investigate the shooting, not coordinate stories with the DoJ.

Government officials are engaged in a counter-blame game claiming that the dead man was about to confess to a triple murder, right before the FBI shot him 7 times in vital organs with a final shot to the back of the head that took place just inside the front door of his home. Clearly, he was trying to escape from the FBI interrogation. He couldn’t possibly have committed the triple homicide since he was in Atlanta at the time, according to his wife.

Family and close friends say Todashev was never previously interviewed about the murders. He and other family members had however been repeatedly questioned by the FBI about their connections to the Tsarnaevs.

Khusen Taramov was with Ibrahim Todashev when the FBI arrived. Concerned, he waited outside in the parking lot for hours. According to Todashev’s widow, Taramov told her that three men describing themselves as FBI agents from Boston entered the home. He was unaware of any state troopers. A local Orlando FBI agent named Chris entered the home as well, but he was asked to leave shortly before the murder took place.

Todashev’s widow, Reniya told TMO: “They started interview at 7:30pm. Khusen was told to leave at 11:30pm, and by the autopsy he was shot at 12:15am. The doctor told the funeral home, because the time was put on the death certificate.”

The deputy chief medical examiner was Gary Lee Utz under the supervision of chief investigator Carol Crosby in Orlando, Florida. “Gary is the doctor who did the autopsy report,” said Reniya. “He’s the one who open his body.”

The FBI has provided no information about the Todashev shooting, except that the unnamed agent, two unnamed Massachusetts State Police troopers and unspecified others were questioning Todashev as part of the investigation into the Boston Marathon bombings when he was killed. However, the FBI has refused to explain the confrontation that led to the fatal shooting. Conflicting details of events were provided by anonymous police sources to the media.

Todashev had been cooperating with investigators and spoke voluntarily with the FBI at least three times at their office before they came to his apartment to kill him. His father, Abdulbaki Todashev accused the FBI of “premeditated, intentional murder.”

Hassan Shibly, director of CAIR Florida, said that federal immigration officials arrested two potential witnesses to the FBI’s conduct the week leading up to the shooting. Todashev’s housemate, Tatiana Gruzdeva, who was actually Taramov’s girlfriend, was arrested for having an expired visa days before Todashev was killed and was deported to Russia on October 11 after she gave a media interview. Todashev’s friend, Ashurmamad Miraliev, was ordered to leave the country in November.

The American Civil Liberties Union asked MA Attorney General Martha Coakley to launch an independent investigation, given the involvement of Massachusetts law enforcement, but she turned down the request. Governor Deval Patrick remains silent.

“When something goes wrong during an operation involving Massachusetts law enforcement officers, Massachusetts residents deserve a thorough and transparent investigation by Massachusetts officials,” wrote Carol Rose, executive director of the ACLU of Massachusetts, in her letter to Coakley.

“Todashev’s family and friends have said he did nothing wrong and have sharply questioned the FBI’s account of the shooting,” reports Maria Sacchetti at the Boston Globe.

Todashev is often said to be a friend of Tamerlan, one of two brothers suspected of bombing the Boston Marathon killing three people and injuring more than 260 others.

However, his widow told TMO that the two men only knew each other from the gym. They had never visited in each others’ homes. Their families did not know each other. This seems to be a case of racial profiling resulting in the death of an innocent man.

About a week before the marathon bombing, Tamerlan Tsarnaev called Ibrahim Todashev wishing him well after his recent knee surgery. At the time of his murder, Todashev was still limping around on crutches. The FBI most likely targeted Todashev as a result of warrantless spying followed by a superficial interpretation of his telephone call log.

“To us as family members we have no clue who killed him, who was there, how many… no details… nothing,” Reniya Todashev told TMO.

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Whereas the American Studies Association is committed to the pursuit of social justice, to the struggle against all forms of racism, including anti-semitism, discrimination, and xenophobia, and to solidarity with aggrieved peoples in the United States and in the world;

Whereas the United States plays a significant role in enabling the Israeli occupation of Palestine and the expansion of illegal settlements and the Wall in violation of international law, as well as in supporting the systematic discrimination against Palestinians, which has had documented devastating impact on the overall well-being, the exercise of political and human rights, the freedom of movement, and the educational opportunities of Palestinians;

Whereas there is no effective or substantive academic freedom for Palestinian students and scholars under conditions of Israeli occupation, and Israeli institutions of higher learning are a party to Israeli state policies that violate human rights and negatively impact the working conditions of Palestinian scholars and students;

Whereas the American Studies Association is cognizant of Israeli scholars and students who are critical of Israeli state policies and who support the international boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement under conditions of isolation and threat of sanction;

Whereas the American Studies Association is dedicated to the right of students and scholars to pursue education and research without undue state interference, repression, and military violence, and in keeping with the spirit of its previous statements supports the right of students and scholars to intellectual freedom and to political dissent as citizens and scholars;

It is resolved that the American Studies Association (ASA) endorses and will honor the call of Palestinian civil society for a boycott of Israeli academic institutions.  It is also resolved that the ASA supports the protected rights of students and scholars everywhere to engage in research and public speaking about Israel-Palestine and in support of the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement.

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The Muslim Council of Britain adds its voice in condemning the execution of a Bangladesh opposition leader, Abdul Quader Molla, on Thursday 11 December.
The Bangladesh government has defied calls from the international community to act justly.

The United Nations made a last ditch attempt to call a halt to the execution. Human rights groups such as Amnesty International condemned this state murder, others, such as Human Rights Watch, criticised the trial of Mr Mollah that led to his execution.

And in Britain, the Foreign Office Minister Sayeeda Warsi had urged the Bangladesh government not to proceed. Baroness Warsi was joined by shadow Foreign Secretary Douglas Alexander.
Farooq Murad, Secretary General of the MCB said:

“It is a sad day for Bangladesh and sad day for democracy and justice. The trial process of Abdul Quader Molla was fraught with flaws and the international community including the UN and all respected Human Rights organisations world over strongly criticised the trial as unfair, biased and politically driven.”

“Many British Bangladeshi Muslims still have ties to that country and there is deep unease that this act will propel Bangladesh, a country of some 155 million, into further instability at best, anarchy at worst.”

“Bangladesh has a proud tradition of religious pluralism. We call on all Bangladeshis to exercise dignity and wisdom to preserve this pluralism following this unjust execution.”

“Abdul Quader Mollah was tried for crimes committed during Bangladesh’s war of independence in 1971. We agree that those guilty of such crimes should be brought to book. However, Mr Mollah vehemently contested the charges put to him, and he was not allowed to properly defend himself in an open and transparent judicial process, supervised by international jurists.”

“We now have a situation where there will be more bereaved families, more impunity and more unanswered questions for justice.”

The Muslim Council of Britain expresses its sincere condolences to the family of Abdul Quader Molla and call on the British government to urgently review its relationships with the Bangladeshi authorities. These include a review of aid delivered to Bangladesh, and a review of Bangladesh’s position within the Commonwealth.

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London, Dec 17 (PTI)

A 32-year-old Indian-origin British surgeon, imprisoned in Syria for over a year after volunteering to help the victims of violence in the war-torn country, has died in detention, his family said Tuesday.

Dr Abbas Khan, an orthopaedic surgeon from Streatham, south London, travelled to the city of Aleppo last year to help civilians.

His brother Afroze said the Syrian National Security Agency had promised his release this week butMonday it said he had died, BBC reported.

“My brother was going to be released at the end of the week. We were given assurance by the Syrian government. My brother knew that. He was ready to come back home. He was happy and looking forward to being released,” Afroze was quoted as saying by BBC.

“We are devastated, distraught and we are angry at the Foreign Office for dragging their feet for 13 months,” he said.

A spokesperson for the Foreign Office was quoted as saying, “We are extremely concerned by reports that a British national has died in detention in Syria.”

Abbas, who was married with two young children, spent a year training as a surgical registrar in Carlisle and also worked at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital, a report in The Times said.

He had been volunteering with Human Aid, a charity, during a six-month sabbatical from Epsom and St Helier University Hospitals NHS Trust, when he went missing, it said.

For five months, Abbas’s family feared that he was dead. Eventually, they tracked him down to a military prison, where he said he had been starved and beaten.

He was transferred to better conditions in a prison outside Damascus, where his mother — a British-Indian – has spent the past four months begging Syrian bureaucrats for his release, the report said.
“I have kissed the shoes of so many officials,” Fatima Khan, 57, was quoted as saying.

Another brother of Abbas, Shahnawaz Khan, also a doctor, has said that the family had little choice but to attribute the lack of progress in securing his release to the fact he is a Muslim of Indian descent.

“There is a creeping sensation that, had my brother been John Smith, there might have been more action by now,” Dr Khan, a research fellow at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital in Stanmore, northwest London, told The Times last month.

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Executive director of PILER recognized for his efforts.

Press Release

KARACHI: The Pakistan Institute of Labour Education and Research’s (PILER) executive director, Karamat Ali, has been awarded the South Asia Dadi Nirmala Deshpande Peace and Justice Award in Patiala, India.

This was the first edition of the award, with next year’s edition to be held in Pakistan. The award will be given to peace promoting individuals of the region on October 17 every year, which marks Didi Nirmala’s birthday

Speakers present at the award talked about the issues of Afghanistan and their impact on the region as well as the role of NATO forces and the actions of US allies in the South Asia region.
Both India and Pakistan were asked to slash their military budget by 10 per cent and to sign a ‘no-war pact’. Peace in the region would free up capital in both countries, leading to prosperity in the area, said the award winner.

Karamat Ali expressed his delight and pride at winning the award and called for relaxed visa norms within South Asian countries.

The event started with PILER’s Farhat Fatima paying tribute to Didi Nirmala Deshpanday for her role in promoting peace in the South Asia region. A cultural show was organized at the end of the event, which exhibited the role of artistes in promoting peace and strengthening the relationship of the countries.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 21st, 2013.

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UN warns that nearly three-quarters of country’s population will need humanitarian support in 2014

By Martin Chulov in Beirut

A general view showing damages after what activists said was an airstrike with explosive barrels from forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad in Al-Shaar area in Aleppo December 17, 2013. REUTERS/Molhem Barakat

The UN has launched its biggest ever appeal for humanitarian aid after exhausting funds raised to help Syria this year, and said nearly three-quarters of the country’s population will need help in 2014.
It estimates that close to half of Syria’s population has been displaced, while the World Food Programme says a similar number need “urgent, life-saving food assistance”.

The former British foreign secretary David Miliband, now president of the International Rescue Committee, said large parts of the Syrian population were threatened by starvation.

The UN aims to raise a total of $6.5bn (£4bn) for Syria alone, 63% more than the $4bn target it set during its last appeal in June, which was only 60% funded.

More than 2.3 million refugees have fled to neighbouring Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey and the Kurdish north of Iraq, where many have struggled to find shelter, heating and food.

Lady Amos, the UN undersecretary general for humanitarian affairs, said the ever-deteriorating situation was “one of the biggest crises in modern times”. She said Syrian refugees “think the world has forgotten about them”.

Miliband described the conflict as “the defining humanitarian crisis of this century so far”.

After 33 months of ever-increasing savagery, there is no end in sight to the war, which poses a serious threat to the unitary boundaries of Syria, Lebanon and Iraq and continues to raise sectarian tensions across the Middle East.

Once entirely food and water-sufficient, there have been signs in parts of Syrian society in recent months of malnutrition, particularly among the rural poor who have fled homes in the west and north but have remained internally displaced rather than crossing borders.

The UN estimates that more than 6.3 million internal refugees are scattered throughout the country, a number that is expected to rise further by the middle of next year.

Medical agencies complain of limited access to war-torn areas, blaming regime forces and opposition groups for preventing deliveries of medicines and in some cases hijacking convoys.

More than 125,000 people have been killed in the fighting, which has descended into a series of stalemates in which neither side can make meaningful advances.

Daily death tolls across Syria have persistently hovered near 100 or more for much of the past year, making the war more deadly than any point during the height of the insurgency in neighbouring Iraq.
More than 90 people were killed in Syria’s second city, Aleppo, on Monday morning after Syrian air force helicopters dropped improvised explosives, known as barrel bombs, on three opposition neighbourhoods. Activists reported that 26 of those killed were children.

Opposition groups claimed that more than 20 such bombs were dropped on the east of the city in the early hours, in the most intense blitz for many months. Aleppo and other parts of the north have also been hit regularly by medium-range ballistic missiles, including scuds, fired from nearby Damascus.

However, single-strike death tolls as high as this are rare.

A doctor in the Bustan al-Qasr neighbourhood, parts of which were flattened by at least two bombs, said his makeshift clinic had been overrun by parents bringing seriously wounded children to him. “It’s worse than it has ever been here,” he told the Guardian via Skype. “None of the people I saw were fighters. None of them were even adults.”

Maria Calivis, Unicef’s regional director for the Middle East and north Africa, said: “It is absolutely unacceptable for children to be targeted in this manner, whether through the use of indiscriminate weapons resulting in mass casualties or by any other means.”

In recent months communities in parts of Aleppo and its surrounds have increasingly fallen under the sway of jihadist groups, who joined the insurgency to transform the war into an epicentre of al-Qaida-inspired global jihad.

In recent weeks the western-supported Free Syrian Army (FSA) has lost considerable influence due to the rise of the al-Qaida groups and a reconfiguration of many militias in the north who have united under an Islamic banner.

The stated purpose of the new group, the Islamic Front, which is understood to be a force of 45,000, is to sideline the Islamic State of Iraq and Jabhat al-Nusra groups that form the core of al-Qaida’s presence in Syria.

However, last week the nascent organisation raided weapons depots of the Free Syrian Army near the Turkish border, sending the FSA leader Salim Idriss fleeing across the frontier and casting serious doubt on his group’s continued relevance as a fighting force.

One mid-ranking leader of the new group said militia leaders in northern Syria had grown impatient both with the FSA and the exiled group of opposition leaders who had attempted, with little success, to act as its political wing.

“They couldn’t deliver at any point,” he said. “They were Europe and the US’s proxies, but they were never resourced. It was clear that their backers weren’t really their backers at all.”

Throughout the past year humanitarian bodies have used increasingly desperate rhetoric to appeal for aid in Syria.

There is concern that the crisis is yet to resonate with parts of the international community fatigued by more than a decade of death and displacement in the Middle East.

“There is a lack of awareness on the part of many about just how desperate conditions are for Syrians,” said Miliband.

“We can say that more than nine million people are in need there, but … it’s extremely difficult to put human faces on cold numbers.

“We are all working to meet the needs of these most vulnerable, but the numbers are increasing so rapidly now, that current resources just aren’t enough.”

The Guardian

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An obsessive’s documenting of Israeli war crimes in Lebanon can show us how the West lost respect for international law

One Norwegian officer left Lebanon with a typed report on torture taped to his chest

Odd Karsten Tveit was always a very obsessional chap. Every story he covered, he always wanted to dig deeper, study further, hear one more tale of horror, one more joke, one more historical fact. We all covered the story of Israel’s wars in Lebanon, in 1978, in 1982, in 1996, in 2006. Over the years, I covered the story of Israel’s torturers in Khiam jail in southern Lebanon, the massive Ansar prison camp in 1982, the frightful interrogation of Lebanese and Palestinian inmates.

But Karsten has put together a book of immense research which will remain the volume on Israel’s shame in Lebanon and its historical defeat. That’s the title of the English edition – Goodbye Lebanon: Israel’s First Defeat. His detailed questioning of torture victims – hanged by their arms, electrocuted, in one case apparently raped and in another mistreated in an Israeli hospital – have an unstoppable power to convince. Not only did he cover the events on the ground in southern Lebanon, he interviewed Israeli veterans in Israel itself.

He reported constantly on Norwegian television and radio; he wanted to learn so much of the vicious Israeli-Hezbollah guerrilla war that he actually took time off to serve in the Norwegian UN battalion n southern Lebanon, wearing the blue beret. Now that is obsession for you.

It is a terrible tale, stories which upset many of the UN peacekeepers, especially military doctors, as evidence mounted of the Israeli brutality on prisoners in Lebanon and inside Israel itself. One Norwegian officer even left Lebanon via Tel Aviv with a typed report on torture taped to his chest for the eyes of a Norwegian government minister.

Prisoners at Ansar were grossly mistreated. Outside the walls of Khiam prison, I visited a post of UN unarmed truth supervisors who told me they could hear the screams of tortured men and women at night. Karsten did the same. Israeli interrogators were present, Karsten says. Israel denied responsibility, saying Khiam was under the control of their local Lebanese militia. The UN did not believe it.

There are also stories of great courage. Two out of the four men who managed to escape from Khiam were hunted through the night and only reached Beirut with the secret help of UN soldiers. They had been inspired by Allied escapes from prison camps in the Second World War. “The prisoners in Stalag III had managed to get hold of equipment by bribing a German guard,” Karsten writes. “In Khiam, such an attempt would likely have meant more torture and confinement in the ‘chicken cage’, the 90-cubic-centimetre enclosure used for extra-severe punishment.”

It was only thanks to an Israeli lawyer that Lebanese prisoners held in Israel – illegally under international law – managed to have their cases heard. Many were held for years without trial, as they were in Khiam, naked during interrogations, refused visits from the International Red Cross, wounds untended or untreated for days.

And I wondered, reading this shameful narrative, why we were so surprised when we found that the American military were torturing and killing prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan. Karsten says at one point that Israeli soldiers in the occupation zone in southern Lebanon – the Israelis called it a ‘security zone’, a description that many newspapers gutlessly repeated – were joint Israeli-American nationals. Did any of them also serve in the American army in Iraq?

The mass prison camp at Ansar sounds like a hot version of Guantanamo. And when the US repeatedly vetoed UN Security Council resolutions condemning Israel’s treatment of Lebanese civilians, I wonder whether somehow that’s when American governments lost their respect for international law – as they showed in their treatment of prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan (or the Iraqi invasion itself).

There are painful details of the torment of Western hostages in Lebanon and the merciless judgements bestowed on informers by Hezbollah. There are not many good guys in Karsten’s reporting. In the end, it turned out that the prisoners of the Israelis were hostages too – the Israelis called them “bargaining chips”, another phrase the press used freely – and they were freed to secure the release of Israeli prisoners or their bodies.

Khiam is long gone. The war in Lebanon is now outclassed by the bloodbath in Syria. Karsten’s work is a reminder that cruelty has no geographic boundaries. How much more is there to learn about the horrors of Lebanon? Or Afghanistan? Or Iraq? Or Syria?

Parallels with Ireland not so clear

I see that Mustafa Barghouti, the leader of the Palestinian National Initiative – which holds no truck with either Hamas or the Palestinian Authority – has been holding forth in Dublin about the parallels of Irish and Palestinian history. “I find great similarity between the struggle of Irish people and the Palestinian struggle for independence and freedom,” he says. That deserved one response: Hmmm.

Visiting Kilmainham jail, he told the Irish Times that he intended to read more about Robert Emmett, executed for a hopeless rising in 1803. “We were also colonised by the British colonial system,” said Barghouti (pictured). “My grandfather and uncle were imprisoned in similar prisons.” Now, he says, the Netanyahu government is “bulldozing the two-state solution and the possibility of a Palestinian state”.

Barghouti wants Ireland’s political help, claiming that without “international solidarity” for a peaceful solution, the Palestinians will not have a state. But I’m not sure Barghouti has chosen quite the right period of Irish history. I would have thought the dispossession of the Catholics and the Protestant settlement in the Pale was a more likely parallel with Netanyahu’s colonial expansion. Getting rid of the Penal Laws wasn’t much of a prospect at the time. Catholics couldn’t even buy land. And “international solidarity” with the Irish wasn’t much use then.

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