Muslim Azerbaijan: Hold on to the Awakening Hijab ban rope of Allah PAGE 6 PAGE 9 PAGE 12 VOLUME 12 - RAMADAN 1432 / AUGUST 2011 In the name of Allah, the Merciful, the Compassionate THE AIMS OF TURNING TO THE ISLAMIC HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION ALLAH FOR I To champion the rights and duties revealed for human beings. LIBERATION I To promote a new social and international order, based on truth, justice, righteousness and generosity, rather than self-interest. I To demand virtue and oppose wrongdoing in the exercise of power (from whatever base that power derives - e.g. political, judicial, media, economic, military, personal, etc.). I To gather information about, and to publicise, atrocities, oppression, discrimination, and other abuses of divinely-granted rights. I To campaign for redress, and to support the victims of such crimes. I To campaign to Egyptians attend Friday prayers at a rally at Cairo's Tahrir Square during a protest calling for national unity and expressed solidarity bring the with the Palestinians as they mark the Nakba. perpetrators and their accomplices to justice. udyard Kipling later emancipated themselves Muslim political thought. The Arab Spring one nation after famously remarked from the direct clutches of their way its sociopolitical role in another is rising up catching the I To cooperate with in his poem The colonial rulers, their influence Muslim societies has evolved West off guard. Who knew that a other groups and Ballad of East and remained. Imam Zaid Shakir has been shaped by un-Islamic 26 year-old Tunisians individuals where R West: “Oh, East is puts it well in his recent article realities such as colonization and Mohammed Bouazizi's suicide East, and West is ‘Reflections on The Islamic the Cold War, and by un-Islamic would shake up the brutal such cooperation is West, and never the twain shall Legitimacy of the Muslim institutions such as the regimes in the region. We have likely to further the meet”. Uprisings’, describing the very International Monetary Fund, seen the fall of Ben Ali, Mubarak achievement of these He was wrong. They did instruments used by the West to the World Bank and now the and possibly others. The people aims. meet and in a violent and put the Muslim world into a neo- World Trade Organization. To of those nations have had suf - destructive way. The West colonial order: declare this arrangement beyond fered long enough and are now imposed itself on the world “...as Muslims we should not question, criticism or challenge standing up against their brutal The Islamic Kipling refers to as the East in the see ourselves as being eternally is not only unjust, it is a betrayal monarchs and dictators. This is a Human Rights form of the slave trade and colo - trapped in a world where we are of Muslim history”. promising sign for civilians in Commission is an nialism. To this day the fallout the helpless objects of the actions The West has been trying to those nations; freedom and lib - from this inhuman interaction of others who have constructed control Muslim leadership for erty are in the horizon. Various NGO in Special continues and imperialism con - institutions that are antithetical decades. It supported and spon - grassroots civil society organisa - Consultative Status tinues under the guise of globali - to our values and interests. The sored brutal regimes and tions and religious scholars have with the Economic sation. After the First World War, nation-state system in the adopted them as allies. Before been working for this moment the Ottoman Empire was dis - Muslim world is less than one the ousting of Mubarak, Tony for decades. Hundreds more and Social Council membered and divided up hundred years old. As an institu - Blair called him "immensely people have been added to the of the United between the British and the tion it has debatable legitimacy courageous and a force for good. Continued on page 11 Nations French. Although these lands and authenticity according to With the flowering of the Islamic Human Rights Commission PO Box 598, Wembley HA9 7XH, UK - Tel: 020 8904 4222 www.ihrc.org 2 IHRC IHRC Bookshop, Gallery and Information Centre 010 marked another The gallery hosts monthly milestone in IHRC's events including poetry readings, development with the author book signings and lectures. opening of our long- Since the start of 2011, IHRC has awaited bookshop, already been host to journalist 2 gallery and information David Cronin, author and human centre. rights campaigner Lawrence Over 100 guests turned up on a Archer, ex-Guantanamo detainee snowy December evening for the Moazzam Beg and anti-racism venue's inauguration. They writer Arun Kundnani. included the Rev Frank Gelli, This July saw a moving event Shaykh Mohammed Saeed to mark the fifth year in detention Bahmanpour and the Muslim without trial in the UK of activist Council of Britain. Others who and poet Talha Ahsan. Amongst couldn't attend such as Jeremy the readers of Ahsan’s poetry were Corbyn, Rabbi Yisroel Dovid renowned human rights lawyer Weiss of Neturei Karta, USA and Gareth Peirce and veteran peace Customer browsing through Dr Nazreen Nawaz of Hizb ut- campaigner Bruce Kent. This was books Tahrir, sent their support via video also the first IHRC event to be messages. streamed live from the premises. profits from sales go to the IHRC The venue is home to a variety To watch future live events or Trust. Without your support to date of artworks ranging from the pho - watch recordings of other IHRC IHRC would not have been able to tographic prints of Per Engström’s programmes tune in on-line at come this far in helping those trip to Xinjiang in China to wood http://www.ihrc.tv. whose rights have been denied, craft from Pakistan and Iran and The shop’s catalogue is being and in fighting to achieve peace Batik Quranic verses from added to the Islamic Human and justice. By continuing to Indonesia. Rights Commission Trust on-line support us you are a part of that The books cover a range of shop, so all our supporters can take struggle. titles for the discerning reader con - advantage of this facility. All cerned with human rights issues and Islamic thought. There are classics from Frantz Fanon, Sayyid Qutb, Dr Ali Shariati and Edward Said as well as new and lesser known works from around the world. We are proud to stock the Radical Pamphlets series pub - lished by Citizens International covering issues of structural vio - lence. There is even a sizeable chil - dren's section offering fiction and non-fiction at the premises based at 202 Preston Road, Wembley, in Gareth Pearce talking about the case of Talha Ahsan northwest London. With a coffee machine and comfortable sur - roundings, everyone is welcome to visit and read, or make an appoint - ment to learn more about Islam Past monthly author evening adverts and human rights. Author Lawrence Archer discussing his book Ricin the inside story of the terror plot that never was Islamic Human Rights Commission PO Box 598, Wembley HA9 7XH, UK Tel:020 8904 4222 Fax: 020 8904 5183 Email: [email protected] IHRC is a company limited by guarantee. Company No: 04716690 Website: www.ihrc.org Grand opening of the IHRC Bookshop, Gallery, and Information Centre IHRC 3 MESSAGE Pass Registered Charity in England & Wales No. 1103023 154 Enterprise Court Eastways Industrial Estate FROM THE the Witham, Essex, CM8 3YS, UK p: +44 (0)1376-521 250 f: +44 (0)1376-521 257 e: [email protected] Paracel w: www.betacharitabletrust.org for Food CHAIRMAN Programme he past year has been a ways to bring to account those who 2011 very eventful and chal - are guilty of crimes. However lenging one for those amongst the opposition who Muslims around the have allowed the peoples’ legiti - ʻPass the Parcelʼ is the annual BCT food parcel world. The first half of mate aspirations to be hijacked £20 T programme. The drive this year will take place 2011 saw the fall of must also either urgently change oppressive dictators and the shak - track or be delegitimized by the between June-August and the aim is to provide aid ing of others. And as old orders are people they have misled. to the poor and needy in Afghanistan, Africa, India, being confronted and challenged This tactic to extend hegemony Middle East, and Pakistan. by the masses, the strategies being is not new. We saw it in the 1980s employed to maintain a semblance and 1990s in Afghanistan; again in For a typical food parcel (oil, rice, wheat, flour, sugar of that old order have also begun to the invasion of Iraq, and we saw it etc), the average cost would be around £20 and change with the times. The tools of in the manipulation of the would provide for a family of 4-5 people for a whole misinformation are being sharp - Darfurian liberation struggle; all month. ened into more sophisticated were converted into extensions of weapons, whilst more tried and US and Israeli foreign policy. The To support this drive and for more details and tested methods are undergoing question we must ask is whether information about the BCT projects and activities, cosmetic makeovers so that they those struggling for justice, includ - kindly contact us or visit can be presented in new guises. All ing Muslims, have learned any - this is taking place amid an atmos - thing from these events or are phere of increasing fear and hate, bound to repeat the same mis - www.betacharitabletrust.org which is being actively fostered to takes? distract people from the real chal - On another front, we witness For more information of our lenges at hand.