Muslims burn a person accused of burning copy of Quran

A traveler in his 30s who was murdered by an angry mob on Friday, 21st Dec 2012 in Seeta village village of Sindh, a southern province of Pakistan. The traveller had sought a night's sleep in the local mosque, as is customary for out-of-town strangers to do in this part of the world.

He offered Isha prayers (on Thursday) and spent the night here. When (worshippers) came to the mosque for Fajr prayers (on Friday morning), the local imam and others found charred copies of the Holy Quran. The visitor for some reason allegedly lit one or more of copies of the Quran on fire.

The traveller was handed over to police after beaten by locals. And the imam of the mosque announced the incident on horn loudspeakers. More number of people assembled and about 1000 people attacked the police station. A group of 30 people led the mob, dragged the traveller out of police station and brought him to the center of the village. They assualted him brutally, poured kerosine and burnt him. 

The suspect spoke in Saraiki accent. Saraiki is a Punjabi language group and is also spoken among many Hindus in the region. In the brief time that he was in the custody of the police, the man in custody, he refused to give up his identity. He is said to be mentally unstable and he was unable to provide basic information about himself like name and address. 

An average of 53 people a year have faced blasphemy charges between 1986, when the law went into effect, and 2010. Of these, 52 people were murdered by angry vigilantes before their cases could be handled by the courts. About 1,400 blasphemy cases have been brought before Pakistan's courts and 15 people are on death row after having been found guilty of blasphemy. Local Muslim preachers (imam) play a prominent role in strengthening the charges of blasphemy and provocate local people to put pressure on the authorities. In many cases, vested interests misuse the laws to settle scores or to prosecute minorities.

Police have arrested more than 100 people in the village and neighboring areas. Immediately after the arrest, women of the village have protested in the street against the police action with copies of Quaran in their hands. 

Islamists reject health to protect Islam

Isamists perceive UN sponsored polio vaccination as a Western tool to undermine Islam. They choose, as usual, Islam over Health initiative.

  

At least eight Pakistani health workers were shot to death in the 3rd week of December 2012 all over Pakistan as they administered the vaccination to children. The Associated Press is reporting a ninth person has died: a 20-year-old man who'd been shot in the head in Peshawar.

Six people were killed on Tuesday as they went house-to-house to treat children. At that time, Pakistan was determined to continue vaccinating children. Now the WHO says Pakistan and "affected" provinces are concerned over the safety of health workers, and they're shutting the program down for now. U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon called the slayings "senseless and inexcusable".

The health workers were murdered in a coordinated fashion. The first to die was a man killed in Karachi on Monday; four women were slain the following day. Then gunmen on motorcycles killed a woman vaccinating children in Peshawar, and a man in the same city on Wednesday. An eighth victim, a woman in a town to the north, was killed later that day.

Women are essential to the success of Pakistan's polio outreach, notes Dina. They can gain access to homes and speak to mothers, a situation where strange men would not be permitted. And polio is a problem in Pakistan. The WHO says polio is endemic in three countries: Afghanistan, Nigeria and Pakistan.

The U.N. has halted its participation in a Pakistani-run polio vaccination program following attacks on health care workers. It clarified that the program has not been suspended. The Pakistani government would not end the campaign and is committed to seeing polio eradicated and has suspended vaccinations only in Sindh province, where Karachi is located.

Rape statistics in US prisons

The US has the highest prisoners in the world with over 2million people living behind bars across the country.  Increasing number of Women prisoners face sexual intimidation, and assault in the Prison. According to recent statistics, an estimated 9.6 percent of former inmates at state prisons nationwide faced one or more incidents of sexual victimization. About 5.4 percent of former state prisoners said they had witnessed an incident involving another inmate, while 5.3 percent reported an incident involving prison staff. 

Each one of about 50 women of Tutwiler prison in the US state of Alabama, when contacted reported sexual assault, mostly by prison officials. In one incident, Monica Washington, a woman prisoner, became pregnant after being raped by a prison guard. Although her case was taken to court, the guard was charged with criminal sexual misconduct and served 6 months in prison. He was not charged with rape charges. #

Pope joins twitter to promote conversions

President of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, Claudio Maria Celli announced on 4th Dec 2012 that Pope Benedict would join twitter at the twitter address @pontifex. The move was motivated by desire of Pope to encounter men and women where ever they are, and begin a dialogue with them. 

The first tweet was published on 12th Dec 2012, around 10.30am as announced earlier @pontifex and seven other associated accounts in different languages.  At the time of first tweet the Pope accounts had a million followers. The name of the account means "bridge-builder" as well as "pontiff" in Latin. The accounts followed only sever other papal accounts. Each of them would tweet the same message, at the same moment, in languages including Polish, Portuguese and Arabic.   

His message read in English: "Dear friends, I am pleased to get in touch with you through Twitter. Thank you for your generous response. I bless all of you from my heart." Within hours the message had been re tweeted more than 30,000 times, with more than 10,000 other users marking it as one of their favourites. Many responded in the spirit intended. "Dear holy father, we live in secular countries, please keep us in your prayers!" replied the Catholic youth movement World Youth Day. About an hour after the first came the second papal tweet. "How can we celebrate the Year of Faith better in our daily lives?" Then @pontifex answered his own question. "By speaking with Jesus in prayer, listening to what he tells you in the gospel and looking for him in those in need." Further questions and responses followed, selected from among the many thousands tweeted to the accounts in previous days.

According to Vatican, the 85 year old pontiff had been personally very keen to get himsefl a twitter account.  The microblogging site was keen to have a papal account. The company has a department dedicated to extending its brand among celebrity and influential figures, and reportedly employs around 20 staff solely to recruit high profile tweeters. Twitter's head of social innovation, Claire Diaz-Ortiz, had travelled to Rome to prepare the Vatican team for the big moment; after Benedict's inaugural message she tweeted on her own feed @claire: "The Pope is on Twitter. #done"

Vatican will have people to manage papal tweet accounts. Subsequent tweets will be written by others they will be approved by the Pope, according to Vatican spokesman - "not physically, but from his mind".

The tweet and the hype around it would be used by the Church to promote proselytizing of the non christian world.  The name and the tone of the initial messages clearly indicates this intent. 

German law protects ritual circumcision

The German parliament passed a law protecting the right of Jewish and Muslim parents to choose a ritual circumcision for their sons as reported on 12th Dec 2012.  434 legislators voted for the new law proposed by the federal government; there were 100 votes against, and 46 abstentions. Last May after a Cologne District Court ruled that the circumcision of a Muslim minor was a criminal assault, a heated debate over the practice and Muslim leaders demanded a legal response that would protect their religious freedom.

Hindu doctor killed in Pakistan

A well-known Hindu doctor was shot and killed by unidentified gunmen in the restive Balochistan province of southwest Pakistan on Dec 13th 2012. Lakshmi Chand was going home when two gunmen riding a motorcycle fired at him in Mastung town. Chand was killed instantly and the gunmen fled from the spot. Police sent the body for an autopsy and registered a case.  Members of the minority Hindu community in Balochistan have been targeted by criminal gangs and extremists in recent months. Several Hindus, mostly petty traders, have been kidnapped for ransom. The murder appears to be one of the episodes of continued persecution of Hindus in Pakistan by Islamic adherents.

Tatto is against Islam

A tattoo on body of an adherent of Islam is against Shariyat, according to
a recent fatwa issued by Darul Uloom Deoband as reported on Dec 6th 2012.
The namaz offered by such a person will not be accepted. If the tattoo was
on parts of the body washed during wazoo, the person cannot offer namaz.
The person will have to get it removed.

A youth's friend got a tattoo made on his arm. Later ,he realised that he
had committed a mistake. So, he went to the doctor to get rid of it. But
the doctor said that it will need a graft surgery which involved a lot of
money. The youth, who hailed from a humble background, could not bear the
cost of it. So he asked the clerics at Deoband if his namaz would be
accepted if there was a tattoo on his body. In response, Darul Uloom's
Mufti Arif provided this ruling.  The fatwa has been supported by Bareilly
Markaz as well.

Bareilly Center (Markaz) is an Indian-based prestigious Islamic
organization that has a large following world-wide. Islamic scholar and
sufi Ahmed Raza Khan Fazil-e-Barelvi(1856–1921 CE) influenced the Barelvi
movement of South Asia and his son, Mustafa Raza Khan, commonly known as
Mufti e Azam e Hind, was born in Bareilly. Ahmed Raza Khan was an authority
on numerous topics, including Islamic law, religion, philosophy and the
sciences. He was a prolific writer, producing nearly 1,000 works in his
lifetime. These scholars were instrumental in enhancing the importance of
Bareilly Center of Islam.

The ruling is also applicable for perfume containing alcohol as well.