A Chinese company has won a contract to build a 1.8 billion dollar monorail to carry pilgrims around the city of Makkah, Saudi Arabia announced during a visit by Chinese President Hu Jintao. China Railway Co won the deal to construct the rail link between Makkah and the holy sites of Mina, Arafat and Muzdalifah. The project was announced at a state dinner hosted by Saudi King Abdullah for Hu, who was on a three-day visit last month, to shore up economic relations with the OPEC powerhouse and discuss energy supplies.

Iranian Chief Prosecutor Ayatollah Qorban-Ali Dori-Najafabadi charged 29 senior Zionist officials with committing war crimes during the 22-day offensive on the Gaza Strip. Israel’s 22-day assault on Gaza left over 1,300 Palestinians dead and destroyed or damaged thousands of buildings across the coastal enclave.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Defense Minister Ehud Barak, Mossad chief Meir Dagan, Chief of the General Staff of the IDF Gabi Ashkenazi, and Attorney General Menachem Mazuz were the highest ranking Israeli officials charged with war crimes.

The charges against the Zionist officials include aggression, occupation, threatening regional and international peace and security, war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide, and clear and repeated violations of human rights and international law.

Along with the 29 Israeli officials, another 114 members of the Zionist regime’s military forces have been charged with war crimes. The case will soon be heard in a symbolic trial in Tehran. The measure by Iran’s chief prosecutor came a few days prior to the opening of a two-day international conference on Palestine in Tehran held to condemn the Zionist regime and to collect evidence of Israel’s crimes from all over the world.n

(CNN) — Ten U.S. Muslim organizations threatened this week to cease working with the FBI, citing “McCarthy-era tactics” by the agency, including efforts to covertly infiltrate California mosques.
Stephen Tidwell, then of the FBI’s Los Angeles office, speaks at the Islamic Center of Irvine in 2006.
The groups claim the FBI has sent undercover agents posing as worshippers into mosques, pressured Muslims to become informants, labeled civil rights advocates as criminals and spread misinformation.

The FBI declined to comment on specific allegations but called the proposed move unproductive.
“Limiting honest dialogue, especially when complex issues are on the table, is generally not an effective advocacy strategy,” spokesman John Miller said in a statement. “The FBI has continued our outreach efforts, across the board, with a number of concerned groups and where we agree — or disagree — most have concluded the best results are achieved through continued conversation. We believe that, too.”

The group’s statement, dated Tuesday, said several incidents of the FBI “targeting Muslim Americans lead us to consider suspending ongoing outreach efforts.”

The statement was issued by the American Muslim Taskforce on Civil Rights and Elections, whose director, Agha Saeed, couldn’t immediately comment because of a family emergency.
The FBI has sent “agents provocateur” into California mosques, according to the statement, which says an FBI agent threatened to make one mosque member’s life a “living hell” if he did not become an informant.

Statement’s Signatories

The following groups signed the statement threatening to cut ties with the FBI:

• American Muslim Alliance
• American Muslims for Palestine
• Council on American-Islamic Relations
• Islamic Educational Center of Orange County
• Islamic Circle of North America
• Muslim Alliance in North America
• MAS Freedom
• Muslim Student Association-National
• Muslim Ummah of North America
• United Muslims of America

Though the statement does not name the mosque member, the Council on American-Islamic Relations said last month it would seek an investigation into the February 21 arrest of Ahmadullah Niazi, an Afghanistan native.

“Mr. Niazi previously reported to [CAIR’s Los Angeles office] and other community members that, during a raid of a friend’s house, an FBI agent urged Mr. Niazi to work with the agency, saying that if he refused to cooperate his life would be made a ‘living hell,’ “ a news release said.
Niazi, a member of the Islamic Center of Irvine, told CAIR his arrest was retaliation for his refusal, the release said.

The FBI directed questions about Niazi’s arrest to the U.S. attorney’s office in Los Angeles, California, which declined comment.

Niazi, 34, was indicted last month on charges of perjury, procuring naturalization unlawfully, using a passport procured by fraud and making false statements. A search warrant for Niazi’s Tustin, California, home said Niazi became a naturalized citizen in 2004 and made false statements about his past aliases and international travel.

He also made false statements about contact with his brother-in-law Amin ul-Haq, the indictment said. Ul-Haq is said to be Osama bin Laden’s security coordinator and has been labeled a “specially designated global terrorist” by the U.S. government, the indictment said.

An FBI agent said in open court that Niazi also had discussed terrorist plots with an undercover informant, according to media reports. Niazi has pleaded not guilty to the charges against him.
CAIR’s problems with the FBI began before Niazi’s arrest. Last year, the FBI discontinued its “formal contact” with CAIR.

The Tuesday statement said the FBI unjustly designated CAIR and other organizations as “unindicted co-conspirators” in the Holy Land Foundation case. A jury convicted Holy Land Foundation leaders last year of conspiring to support terrorism and launder money for a terrorist group.

“Making this unjust designation public violates the Justice Department’s own guidelines and wrongly implies that those listed are somehow involved in criminal activity,” the statement said.

The FBI’s Miller declined to comment on specifics, but said the FBI wants to avoid “formally constructed partnerships” with CAIR.

“Our concerns relate to a number of distinct narrow issues specific to CAIR and its national leadership,” Miller said.

Before the FBI severed formal ties, CAIR officials had met with the FBI to discuss hate crimes targeting Muslims. On occasion, CAIR offered assistance in investigations. The group also held training sessions for FBI agents on Islamic culture and ways to improve interactions with the Muslim community.

Hundreds of Muslim women gathered in Malaysia recently to launch a new global campaign for equality.

Reform of family law is at the heart of the campaign, to tackle what organizers called the “untenable” treatment of some Muslim women. Polygamy, consent to marry, inheritance rights, custody of children after divorce - all are areas where they want change.

Zainah Anwar is at the helm of the campaign. She helped organise the conference in Kuala Lumpur, which culminated in the unveiling of a new organisation called Musawah, which means equality in Arabic. “The disconnect between Muslim family laws that discriminate against women.

Change on such a grand scale may seem unachievable to some, but Musawah is aimed at connecting Muslim women all over the world and uniting their efforts.

Underpinning their campaign is a new interpretation of parts of the Quran. They believe this is crucial to winning arguments with scholars and politicians. Musawah has put forward a case for change. “Most family laws and practices in today’s Muslim countries and communities are based on theories and concepts that were developed by classical jurists (fuqaha) in vastly different historical, social and economic contexts,” it says.

Reforming laws and practices for the benefit of society and the public interest has always been part of the Muslim legal tradition, it adds. But Roya Rahmani, who helped in the campaign to secure a new marriage contract in Afghanistan, said: “These ideas are not going to happen in any country overnight.” “You do need the groundwork,” she added, “so when the right moment comes you can seize the opportunity.”

Success in a country like Afghanistan, in spite of the chaos from decades of conflict, gave many of the women here inspiration. But this global call for the reform of family law has been dampened by warnings from some campaigners that it can only happen in countries with a democratic culture. Imrana Jalal led a 20-year battle for new laws to give women equality in Fiji.. It was a campaign which culminated in wholesale reform. She expressed pessimism about Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, two of the countries most closely associated with Islam. “It is very difficult to try to get good laws passed for women in a non-democratic state,” she said. But democracy is far from all that is required. Alia Hogben lives and works in Canada. She had no shortage of anecdotal evidence of Muslim women there who faced inequity. “What, sadly, some male members of our communities are doing is saying that you must have a religious divorce and that this is nothing to do with Canadian law. That is totally false.

Some of the women who came to Kuala Lumpur live in exile. Others live in fear.

Hatoon Alfassi is well-connected in Saudi Arabia. Either because of that, or in spite of it, she has emerged as a vocal campaigner for women’s rights.

“I believe that Islam has given women equal rights and equal faith,” she said. But she also believes in “criticising and challenging” the authorities in her homeland.

Three years ago she led public protests against a decision to remove women from certain principal prayer areas at the holy mosque in Makkah, placing them at the back.

“I found that was very telling, that we are at the back of this religion,” she said.. Her campaign helped lead to a reversal of the decision.

On family law reform in Saudi Arabia she offers some hope.

“We are having... a little bit [of a] higher ceiling or room for freer discussion, especially on legal issues,” she said. “We have this possibility of introducing many ideas. I am not saying we have the capacity to change the legal structure. But only by challenging their position and decisions; these are ways of making a difference.”

Chinese authorities vowed ‘more severe’ security measures for the Muslim-majority region of Xinjiang, which has already been under draconian security crackdowns.

“The (security) situation will be more severe,” Chairman of the Xinjiang regional government Nur Bekri said, Xinhua news agency reported. “The task (will be) more arduous, and the struggle more fierce in the region this year,” he added on the sidelines of the annual meeting of China’s parliament.

Nearly 3,000 delegates met on the second day of the annual session parliament, which approves decisions made by the Chinese Communist Party last month. Rights groups said that this year’s nine-day meeting has been accompanied by an unprecedented crackdown campaign on opposition figures. “What we’re seeing is that it’s not only in Beijing, but also like in Shanxi and other areas” said Sharon Hom, from the New York-based advocacy group Human Rights in China.

China has waged a harsh campaign in recent years against Uighur Muslims struggling to set up an independent “East Turkestan” in Xinjiang. The Uighurs are a Turkish-speaking minority of eight million whose traditional homeland lies in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region in north-west China.

The US State Department last month accused China of severe repression in Xinjiang in 2008 in a human rights report. Bekri defended the severe security measures in the Muslim-majority region of Xinjiang. “The situation in South Asia, including the Mumbai attacks and attacks in Afghanistan and Pakistan, of course are a spur to the three forces (terrorism, separatism and extremism) and those who want to harm Xinjiang,” he said. “So this year our task is very arduous.”

Rights groups and advocates of Uighur autonomy say China exaggerates the threats there to justify the controls. Almost 1,300 people were arrested by security forces on charges of terrorism, religious extremism in the region last year, according to local media. Bekri said attacks may be launched during China’s celebrations of the 60 years of the Chinese rule in Xinjiang.”As we celebrate the birthday of our nation, we don’t believe that hostile forces from home and abroad will give up.

A US bank has been awarded for offering Shari‘ah-compliant banking products to help American Muslims fulfill their cherished dream of owning a house.

“I never thought I’d be involved in Islamic banking because I’d never even heard of it,” Stephen L. Ranzini, President of the Michigan-based University Islamic Financial Corporation, told The New York Times last month. “And it’s been a stretch to learn it, succeed at it and make it work.” The bank has received the American Bankers Association’s 2009 Community Bank Award largely for helping raise homeownership category among US Muslims. “But you feel best about the things that were hardest to do,” said Ranzini, 43. Muslims are much less likely to be homeowners partially due to the fact that they do not benefit from the conventional bank’s mortgage loans as Islam forbids followers from usury, receiving or paying interest on loans. In December 2005, the University Bank launched an entire subsidiary to help Muslim customers through Shari‘ah-compliant products to help them own houses.

So far, it has done nearly $80 million in “mortgage-alternative” financing for residential and commercial real estate in 15 states.

While many conventional banks went bankrupt over the worsening global financial crisis, the University Bank recorded one of its best periods ever.

Thirteen Muslims have found a place in the annual Honours list of the British government for the year 2009. However, Knighthood has been conferred on a single individual i.e., judge Goolam Hoosen Kader Meeran who was called to the bar in 1982 and later headed several tribunals. Three persons have been awarded Order of British Empire (OBE). They include Salima Hafejee, former director of the Bradford Youth Development Partnership and member of the Youth Justice Board; Dr. Musharraf Hussain, Director of the Karimia Institute in Nottingham ; and Anis Rahman for services to the Bangladeshi people. Member of British Empire (MBE) has been conferred upon Enam Ali, founder of the British Curry Awards which has led to the growth of the Indian and British restaurants to 3.2 billion sterling pounds a year. Others in this category are Ishtiaq ali for services to the community in Lancashire, Mohammed Irfan Faizi chishti, imam, for services to Muslim people, Mamun Rashid Chowdhury for voluntary service to Asian community football in East London, Ebrahim Dockrat, for services to the community in West Yorkshire, Zafar Iqbal, chairman of the Government Bordesley Gree girls School, for services to education, tamsila Tauqir, for services to the Muslim community. Overseas OBE has been conferred upon Iftikhar Ahmed Khan, for services to UK/Bangladesh trade, development relations and corporation social responsibility.

Makhdum Ali Chishty, superintendent, Warwickshire Police has been awarded the Queen’s Police medal (QPM).

The Honours list includes 13 members of the Hindu and Sikh communities while 16 members of the British Jewish community figure in the Honours list.

The Muslim World