A Greek Orthodox school is being taken to the High Court for banning a Muslim pupil from wearing a headscarf.
The nine-year-old girl’s parents were so incensed at the decision they have pulled her out of St Cyprian’s Greek Orthodox Primary Academy, in Thornton Heath. Now they have applied to the High Court in an attempt to force the school – the only one of its kind in the country – to reverse its ban on their daughter wearing a hijab.
The Collectif contre l’Islamophobie en France reports that on Thursday-Friday night four swastikas along with racist slogans riddled with misspellings were sprayed on the wall of the As-Salam de Tomblaine mosque in the Lorraine region of north-east France. (The slogan “Bougnoulle de mourt” would appear to mean something like “death to wogs”.)
The CCIF notes that only a few months ago the mosque at Vandoeuvre, five kilometres from Tomblaine, was also the target of a graffiti attack, although in that case the graffiti were of Kahanist rather than Nazi inspiration.
See also ICI-C-NANCY, 21 December 2012
President Vladimir Putin spoke against the wearing of hijabs at Russian schools Thursday saying that the practice runs counter to Russian traditions. “Why should we adopt outside traditions?” Putin said during a marathon question-and-answer session with Russian and foreign reporters on Thursday.
A test case of Russia’s hijab policy emerged in October, when Muslim parents in a village in Russia’s southern Stavropol Region complained to prosecutors over a ban on headscarves at their daughters’ school. The parents said the ban violated their daughters’ constitutional rights to receive an education and practice their religion.
Rossiiskaya Gazeta reported on Tuesday that Stavropol governor Valery Zerenkov signed regulations banning school students from wearing headscarves as well as “immodest” dress such as shorts and low-cut dresses.
Education and Science Minister Dmitry Livanov had previously said wearing headscarves did not violate any law on education.
It was not immediately clear whether the headscarf ban applies to all educational institutions in the district or only state-run schools.
One year on from his imprisonment, the quashing of Ahmed Faraz’s conviction for the dissemination of terrorism publications, is a great victory for freedom of expression in the UK.
In a damning judgement, the UK Court of Appeal ruled that no causal link could be presented that publications produced by the Maktabah bookshop would inspire acts of political violence or terrorism. They said that it was incorrect of the trial judge to permit evidence that those who had carried out acts of terrorism had owned copies of the books or DVDs and that it was a short cut to a conviction.
A Greek Orthodox school is being taken to the High Court for banning a Muslim pupil from wearing a headscarf.
The nine-year-old girl’s parents were so incensed at the decision they have pulled her out of St Cyprian’s Greek Orthodox Primary Academy, in Thornton Heath. Now they have applied to the High Court in an attempt to force the school – the only one of its kind in the country – to reverse its ban on their daughter wearing a hijab.
Anger at plans for a mosque and evangelical church to be built side-by-side in Melbourne’s east has spilled over amid claims Islam ”directly contravenes our freedom values”.
It was standing room only at the City of Casey chambers in Narre Warren on Tuesday night at one of the last meetings before the council debates a proposal to build a mosque and community centre on a vacant industrial lot in Green Street, Doveton.
The mosque would be next to the church and headquarters of Catch the Fire Ministries, run by controversial anti-Islam Pastor Danny Nalliah who was acquitted of a racial vilification charge brought by the Islamic Council of Victoria in 2006. The church has already been approved by council and construction is expected to begin within weeks.
Residents at the meeting cited traffic concerns, noise pollution, and fears the mosque would be used to preach hate speech.
Mayor Amanda Stapledon repeatedly asked the gallery of about 50 people to be quiet amid booing, cheering and heckling.
Muslim women are the British economy’s major untapped resources. As the latest census reveals a rise in this country’s Muslim population, it’s time to take notice, argues Reyhana Patel.
Hundreds of council tenants have kicked off the festive season in London’s multi-cultural East End by celebrating a faith that’s not their own.
The International Journal of Intercultural Relations has published the results of research by Jonas R. Kunst, David L. Sam and Pål Ulleberg into Muslims’ perceptions of Islamophobia. The article, “Perceived islamophobia: Scale development and validation”, can be consulted here.
Canadian judges should decide on a case-by-case basis whether women can wear the niqab, a full-face veil, while testifying in court, but a blanket rule on the issue would be “untenable,” Canada’s top court said on Thursday.
The decision, supported by four of the seven judges who heard the case at the Supreme Court of Canada, said lower courts must consider, among other things, the harm that could come if Muslim women who wear the niqab feel discouraged from reporting offenses.
But the ruling also said that where a witness’s credibility is central to the case, “the possibility of wrongful conviction must weigh heavily in the balance.” Judges must also consider the sincerity of a witness’s religious beliefs.