Common Ground News Service – Partners in Humanity
(CGNews-PiH)
December 20, 2005

Common Ground News – Partners in Humanity (CGNews-PiH) is distributing the enclosed articles to build bridges of understanding between the West and the Arab world, and countries with significant Muslim populations. Unless otherwise noted, copyright permission has been obtained and the articles may be reproduced by any news outlet or publication, free of charge. If publishing, please acknowledge both the original source and Common Ground News, and notify us at cgnewspih@sfcg.org.

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~*~*~ We would like to wish all our readers a joyous season and a peaceful New Year. The next issue of CGNews-PiH will be delivered on January 3, 2006. ~*~*~

ARTICLES IN THIS EDITION:

1. “Women setting their own agenda” by Asma Afsaruddin
In this fifth article in a series on the role of women in US-Muslim relations, Asma Afsaruddin, Associate Professor of Arabic & Islamic Studies at University of Notre Dame, worries that “women’s roles and their attire assume a disproportionate importance in Western-Muslim relations.” She argues that “the challenge then for women in Muslim societies and in the US is to rise above these superficial and divisive depictions and pursue better communication with one another,” and gives examples of how this can be done.
(Source: CGNews-PiH, December 20, 2005)

2. “For Copts, a conference that shows how Arabs embrace democracy”by Mona Eltahawy
Mona Eltahawy, an Egyptian writer, reports on a conference she participated in on “discrimination against Christians in Egypt and ways for Muslims and Christians to combat the growing politicization of religion.” Although there are still many challenges to overcome, this conference with its diverse participants demonstrates that Muslims and Christians, together, are ready to start saying "enough."
(Source: Daily Star, December 14, 2005)

3. “Many Muslims 'do' condemn terrorism” by Samar Dahmash Jarrah
Why don’t moderate Muslims condemn terrorism? Samar Dahmash Jarrah, an Arab-American Muslim writer who lives in Florida, thinks that “it seems strange that many Americans keep asking a question originating four years ago from a few conservative talking-heads and so-called experts.” Pointing out several examples of moderate Muslims who do speak out against terrorism, she suggests that her readers ask the American media.
(Source: Middle East Times, December 9, 2005)

4. “Islam and the process of democratization in Southeast Asia” by Hassan Wirajuda
This article is condensed from a speech given by Minister of Foreign Affairs, Hassan Wirajuda, in Jakarta on Dec. 6 at the second international roundtable on Islam and Democratization in Southeast Asia: Challenges and Opportunities. He discusses Indonesia’s transformation to democracy, and shows that the debate is no longer on “the merits of democracy and its compatibility with Islam” but instead on “how to make Islam and all other religions an even more effective force for reform and democratization.”
(Source: Jakarta Post, December 7, 2005)

5. “Expulsion doesn't help” by Benjamin Ward
Benjamin Ward, Special Counsel to the Europe and Central Asia division of Human Rights Watch, challenges the growing European tactic of deporting individuals suspected of supporting or inciting terrorist activity. He argues that this mechanism is counterproductive as it “reinforces the view that “Islam is synonymous with terrorism, and sends a signal to Muslim communities that they are not welcome in Europe, risking further alienation among the region's young Muslim citizens.”
(Source: International Herald Tribune, December 2, 2005)

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ARTICLE 1
Women setting their own agenda
Asma Afsaruddin

Notre Dame, Indiana - In discussing the role of women in US-Muslim relations, it is important to first broach the topic of how women are often discursively and symbolically used to demarcate cultural parameters and create a sense of “us” versus “them.” In the “culture war” or, more dramatically, the “clash of civilizations” that is supposedly underway between the United States (or the West in general) and the Muslim world, women’s roles and their attire assume a disproportionate importance. From this vantage point, presumed cultural differences tend to be more sharply etched in people’s minds and contribute to acrimonious debates about women’s well-being, whether defined in physical and/or moral terms on both sides of the divide.

Thus, those who wish to accentuate “civilizational” differences in the West speak of a reified Islam uniformly oppressing women and restricting their civil and human rights. They invoke the veil as a ubiquitous symbol of women’s repression. Their counterparts on the other side of the divide point to the moral degradation of Western women as evident, they will say, in their skimpy attire and the breakdown of the American family. All of this is a consequence, this latter group insists, of the typical decadence to be found in Western societies. Furthermore, some maintain that both human and women’s rights discourses emanating from the secular West are intended to erode the dignity of women and destroy the moral core of Muslim societies.

It is remarkable how persistent these unflattering stereotypes can be both in the West and in the Muslim world, even among relatively educated people. The challenge then for women in Muslim societies and in the US is to rise above these superficial and divisive depictions and pursue better communication with one another. Since women are often deployed as cultural icons freighted with all kinds of political associations, it is women themselves who are in a unique position to dismantle these icons. Women in both parts of the world should assert their own agencies, and in direct communication with one another articulate the complexities inherent in their gendered identities within their specific societal circumstances. Even within a given society, there are huge differentials contingent on socio-economic circumstances, levels of education and support systems, which determine a woman’s sense of well-being and accomplishment. There is, after all, a basic commonality of interests and concerns undergirding women’s lives anywhere in the world. Questions of health, child care, education and employment opportunities are constants in most women’s lives.

It may sound trite to suggest that because women remain fundamentally concerned with the well-being of their families, whether they work or not, certain issues find immediate resonance with them regardless of the ideological framework in which these issues may be found. What follows are two suggestions regarding how women may tap into this reservoir of shared concerns and interests across cultural and religious divides in order to emphasize shared common ground and thus effectively circumvent the rhetoric of divisiveness that forms the master narrative of our times.

The first suggestion is that women from the US and the Muslim world reach out to one another directly and set their own agendas for discussion and negotiation. They can do this both individually and collectively. Individual academics and activists can organize lectures, workshops, and symposia to plan effective ways to empower women socially and politically. Women’s non-governmental organizations in the Muslim world and in the US can initiate collaborative projects with one another. American Muslim women are in a unique position to act as facilitators of many of these projects, since they are able to successfully bridge the cultural divide and be comprehensible to both worlds.

Perceptions are as important as realities: interlocutors who are both American and Muslim can successfully negotiate the pitfalls inherent in the cross-cultural encounters between the US and the Muslim world, especially when the power imbalance is so acute between these two entities. American Muslim women would still be perceived as insiders to a certain extent by their counterparts in the Muslim heartland, making communication less politically fraught.

The second suggestion is that when discussing issues of common concern, one should try to find as much common ground as possible without “ideologizing” these issues. In other words, one should avoid as much as possible replicating the master narratives of civilizational discourses that trumpet greatly accentuated differences between cultures and posit the superiority of one set of values over another (assumed to be the binary opposite). Even the most well-intentioned projects may be undermined by such ideological language. Thus, a respected think-tank in Washington DC recently published a book on women’s rights and roles in Middle Eastern societies, the result of an ambitious survey of a selected number of Middle Eastern countries, conducted by academics and trained researchers in most cases.

Yet an undercurrent of Western triumphalist rhetoric marred the study’s overall effectiveness which assumed that only a relentlessly secular and materialistic perspective would lead to positive results in terms of effecting change in the lives of the women interviewed. As one of the commentators on a pre-publication draft of the survey, I had the occasion to point out that although the survey rightly drew attention to job discrimination against women in a number of Muslim societies and difficulty of access at times to higher education, it barely addressed the issues of health care and did not stress at all governmental and employer responsibilities in providing day care facilities and maternity leaves for women, for example. Veiled and unveiled women all over the world continue to find these issues of pressing concern. If women anywhere choose to define their sense of well-being and empowerment solely in familial terms, then these are the concerns that should be given priority and not the pre-set agendas set by policy-makers and pundits in remote places.

Respecting women’s agency means, first and foremost, letting women articulate their wishes and concerns. It also means listening to them. On such a basis we may collaboratively envision programs and policies that demonstrably improve the quality of women’s lives and of all those around them.

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* Asma Afsaruddin is Associate Professor of Arabic & Islamic Studies at University of Notre Dame.
Source: CGNews-PiH publishes this article, part of a series of views on "The role of women in US-Muslim relations,” in partnership with United Press International (UPI).
Visit our website at www.commongroundnews.org
Distributed by Common Ground News– Partners in Humanity.
Copyright permission has been obtained for publication.

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ARTICLE 2
“For Copts, a conference that shows how Arabs embrace democracy”
Mona Eltahawy

With recent Egyptian parliamentary elections as the perfect backdrop, dozens of Egyptian Christians and Muslims met in Washington in November for the Second International Coptic Conference. If you were to believe the wild accusations that filled the Egyptian media in the weeks preceding the conference, many of us who flew from Egypt to attend were convinced we would be arrested as traitors upon our return.

Instead of convening to discuss discrimination against Christians in Egypt and ways for Muslims and Christians to combat the growing politicization of religion, those wild accusations would have had you thinking we were instead preparing for the invasion of Egypt by foreign troops. Such nonsense was to be expected of course. It was much easier for the government and its media to attack the organizers for holding the conference in Washington than to acknowledge and answer the disturbing questions it raised about discrimination against Christians in Egypt.

The government-controlled media conveniently neglected to mention that the organizers wanted to hold the conference in Egypt, but received no response to the request they sent to Egyptian officials. There was nothing new here - we all remember that the Egyptian government prevented Saadeddin Ibrahim from convening a conference in Egypt in 1994 on minorities in the Arab world. He had to take it to Cyprus instead.

Knowing this, I accepted an invitation to attend and to speak at the conference, for several reasons. It was important to attend as an Egyptian. This is a period that is shaping up to be a real turning point in Egyptian history. It was very apt that the conference was entitled "Democracy in Egypt for Muslims and Christians."

Christian rights belong at the heart of the debate over reform and democracy that has risen to the fore in Egypt over the past year or so. For too long now, the government has presented itself as the only alternative to the politicized Islam of the Muslim Brotherhood. As this year's parliamentary elections showed, the state versus mosque scenario is still very much alive in Egypt. We need an alternative to both. The strong electoral showing by the Brotherhood is a worry not just for Christians, but for all of us who want to separate religion from politics. I share more common interests and concerns with a progressive, secular Christian than I do with a Muslim Brotherhood supporter.

It was also important for me to attend the Coptic conference as a Muslim. The majority of invited guests at the gathering were in fact Muslim. We were there to tell our Christian compatriots that we wholeheartedly oppose the discrimination they face in Egypt. After years of ugly anti-Christian hatred that too often emanates in mosques and government-controlled media, it was imperative that Muslims and Christians, together, said "enough." Many of us who attended as Muslims also share with our Christian compatriots the general lack of rights that is the plight of all Egyptians.

While Egypt's parliamentary elections may have been the perfect backdrop to the debate on democracy at the conference, the ugly riots outside an Alexandria church in October were a sad reminder of sectarianism run amok. And as the violence in Iraq shows, unchecked sectarianism all too easily consumes Muslims too. While it was heartening to see Jordanians take to the streets in protest against the terrorism that caused the recent Amman suicide bombings, it was heartbreaking to hear silence when 10 days later two suicide bombings killed Shiites at prayer in Iraqi mosques. Both episodes must be condemned as terrorism, regardless of whether they killed Sunnis or Shiites.

It was also important to attend the Coptic conference as a woman. While Copts are said to comprise 10 percent of Egypt's population, women - who form 51 percent of Egyptian society - are as marginalized, face the same discrimination, and lack of opportunities that Christians do. In Egypt, there are no Christian mayors, no Christian public university presidents or deans, and there are few Christians in the upper ranks of the security services and the armed forces. There are only two or three Christian ministers at any given time, most Egyptians cannot remember the last time they had a Christian prime minister, and Christians are underrepresented in Parliament. Much the same can be said of women.

The National Democratic Party nominated just two Christian candidates for this year's parliamentary elections - one of whom withdrew after the riots outside the Alexandria church. It also nominated just six women. To end this shameful marginalization, Egypt needs positive discrimination - policies that favour women and Christians.

The conference was a reminder that those who think Egyptians or Arabs can't change or embrace democracy and debate are simply wrong. That was perhaps most poignantly symbolized by the invitation to Raphael Luzon, a Libyan Jew, to speak to the conference about his arrest and expulsion from Benghazi during the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.

For a conference made up mostly of Arabs to acknowledge the discrimination and persecution that Jews in the Arab world faced, it was a clear message that we were ready to move forward with the debate on minority rights in the Arab world. In learning from the pain of the past, we are determined to move towards a happier future.

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* Mona Eltahawy (www.monaeltahawy.com) is an Egyptian writer.
Source: Daily Star, December 14, 2005
Visit the website at www.dailystar.com.lb
Distributed by Common Ground News– Partners in Humanity.
Copyright permission has been obtained for publication.

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ARTICLE 3
Many Muslims 'do' condemn terrorism
Samar Dahmash Jarrah

Florida - It's true. Many Muslims do condemn terrorism - we just don't hear about it in the American news media.

Yet Americans continue to ask: "Why don't Muslims condemn terrorism? We keep waiting for the so-called moderates to speak out against violence and yet no one comes forward." A man in the audience asked me this question recently when I was invited to speak at a Unitarian Fellowship about what Arabs think about the US and Americans. I had just finished saying that many of the Arab people I interviewed for my book a year ago in Egypt, Jordan and Kuwait had condemned fanatics like Osama Bin Laden.

Perhaps the man wasn't listening. And honestly, what if many Muslims condemn terrorism day in and day out? Will this make terrorism go away? I speak to the public several times a month and at half these events the same question is repeated.

I asked the gentleman if he had heard about the Fiqh Council of North America that had recently issued a public fatwa (religious decree) against terrorism. I asked him if he had heard about other prominent Muslim scholars who have taken public stands against terrorism. As always happens with people who ask these questions, he did not know of my examples.

It seems strange that many Americans keep asking a question originating four years ago from a few conservative talking heads and so-called experts. Perhaps this question has been parroted by TV commentators and reporters so much that we have stopped thinking for ourselves. But I believe that we can still think and find the truth on our own. If we try, we might get more answers than questions.

Perhaps we should stop placing blind faith in American news media and look to other sources, perhaps even the Internet for alternative reporting and commentary.

So why does the question persist? The answer is simple. How often do you see Muslims interviewed on American TV? A few here and there. But how many times do you watch TV shows where non-Muslims and non-Arabs talk about Islam and Arabs as if they were experts? Most of the time.

If you really want to know why you're not hearing about Muslims publicly condemning terrorism - ask the US media this question. Ask them why the images of Bin Laden and Zarqawi are better known to the average American than the face and name of Hamza Youssef. Why do such fanatics get more airtime than Youssef and other moderate American-Muslim scholars and thinkers?

Ask why two local newspapers in southwest Florida did not cover a three-lecture series on Islam given by a Muslim, Palestinian-American woman in a Jewish synagogue. Is it because the exchange was civil? Is it because we disagreed amicably? Should we have thrown stones at each other to make the event worthy of coverage?

A year ago I spoke to a group of humanists who complained that the media refused to cover the event. No wonder people still ask me why American Muslims do not participate in interfaith dialogue. We do participate, but we receive little or no news media coverage.

My recent talk was interesting in many ways. A man said, "I agree with only 80 percent of what you said." I replied. "Great! My husband agrees with only 20 percent of what I say."

I was asked if I thought that US troops in Iraq should be withdrawn. "Yes, they should," I replied. "I would especially think so if I were a mother or father of a soldier."

Another man said, "Islam makes people violent because it is like Christianity where followers believe that they must evangelize and convert people into their own faith to be saved. We never hear of Hindu terrorists."

I reminded him of the assassinations of Mahatma Gandhi, Indira Gandhi and her son Rajeev, and the horrors of Hitler, Stalin and Mussolini. None of them were Muslim. Would it be fair to condemn their faiths because of the actions of a few?

I asked the man where Judaism and Christianity would be today if Muslims were truly required by their faith to convert Jews and Christians. What were Muslims doing over the past 1,400 years? Not converting others to their faith.

The questions were pointed, thoughtful and challenging. "Did the US attack on the Iraqi city of Fallujah cause more terrorism?" "Are the recent bombings in Jordan related to the US Army presence in Iraq?" "What do you think of Ahmed Chalabi's visit to Washington?" "Is it true that Arabs teach hatred of Americans in schools?" One woman asked me what I thought of the statement made by the president of Iran about wiping Israel off the map. Another asked, "If there is an independent Palestinian state, will Gaza survive?"

So you see - there are vibrant, inquisitive American minds wanting to know more and understand better. Unfortunately, such dialogues are not sensational news, so they become missed opportunities. Next time you wonder why you don't hear of Muslims condemning terrorism - ask the American media.

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* Samar Dahmash Jarrah is an Arab-American Muslim writer who lives in Florida, USA. She is the author of the book Arab Voices Speak to American Hearts, published in May 2005 by Olive Branch books.
Source: Middle East Times, December 9, 2005
Visit the website at www.metimes.com
Distributed by Common Ground News– Partners in Humanity.
Copyright permission has been obtained for publication.

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ARTICLE 4
Islam and the process of democratization in Southeast Asia
Hassan Wirajuda

Jakarta - There are two realities that dominate national life in Indonesia today -- realities that also define the positive image Indonesia enjoys in the eyes of the world at large.

The first of these two realities is the fact that Indonesia is home to the world's largest Muslim population -- 90 percent of a total population of 220 million, or some 198 million people. It is a Muslim population that is by and large moderate.

Most of the Muslims of Southeast Asia are, of course, moderate and there are moderate Muslims everywhere else. It just happens that international observers take a special view of this huge concentration of moderate Muslims in Indonesia. Perhaps it reassures them that the largest part of Islam is not a threat but a friend and contributor to civilization. At any rate, we are happy and proud that our country is considered the home of moderate Islam.

The second of the two dominant realities in our national life is the fact that Indonesia today is considered the world's third largest democracy.

It is important to note that following last year's successful direct presidential election, the first in our history, local direct elections have started to take place this year for governors, regents and mayors.

We are acutely aware of the fact that democracy in Indonesia is still very much in need of further consolidation.

In this process of transition, Islam, as a moral force in support of reform, has played a strong and positive role, although it must also be said that there have been times when Muslim militants and extremists loomed as part of the problems we were grappling with.

This is not a new role for Islam. Muslim intellectuals and religious leaders have always participated in the political dynamics of Indonesia since our struggle for freedom and sovereignty. The debate about the relationship between Islam and the state was already taking place before we became an independent country, especially when our Founding Fathers drafted our Constitution. However, when we finally won our independence in August 1945, our Founding Fathers reached a consensus that Indonesia should not be an Islamic state based on sharia, and Islam should not be the religion of the state.

But this is not the secularism that the West is well known for, in the sense of a constitutional separation between the state and religion. Instead, by constitutional mandate, the state has the obligation to promote the religious life of the people.

It is important to note, however, that there has also been a convergence between "Islamist" and "nationalist" political orientations. For example, a good number of significant Muslim leaders have formed political parties with nationalist platforms -- such as the National Awakening Party (PKB) and the National Mandate Party (PAN).

Political Islam by itself did not make any headway in the country's transition to a more fully democratic system. In the 1999 general election, all 40 of the Islamic parties combined got no more than 17.8 percent of the votes cast. Subsequently, the proposal for the adoption of sharia, initially planned to be tabled by two parties, was graciously withdrawn in the legislature.

To be sure, not every Indonesian Muslim is a moderate. There are a small number of extremists in Indonesian society -- and they are not all Muslims -- who have resorted to violence to advance their respective agendas.

In October 2002, Indonesia itself suffered a massive terrorist attack in Bali, which killed 202 people. Since then, terrorists have struck with murderous effect, twice in Jakarta -- at the Marriott Hotel in August 2003 and in the vicinity of the Australian Embassy in September 2004 -- and once again in Bali last October.

In the wake of each of these attacks, Indonesia responded in the way a democracy should: balancing security needs, the democratic process and respect for human rights. Our police authorities brought the perpetrators to justice through patient investigation and without any violation of human rights. We could not have done less than that, our people demanded it. Because of past experiences, the Indonesian people are very sensitive to the way our police and the rest of the security apparatus work.

While the police are bringing terrorists to justice -- or killing them if they resist lawful arrest -- the government and Muslim leaders are working together to kill terrorist ideas through peaceful and democratic debate.

This, then, is the sum of Indonesia's experience with Islam and democracy: true Islam is moderate and enlightened. Not only can it flourish side by side with democracy, it can also work together with a democratic government to defend society from its attackers and to reform society. There is no debate about that any more -- not in Indonesia and not in various other Muslim countries.

The debate on the merits of democracy and its compatibility with Islam is over. The challenge in Indonesia today is how to make Islam and all other religions an even more effective force for reform and democratization. It is a pragmatic challenge that demands a pragmatic response.

Democracy, too, has its pragmatic challenge: How can we make our democracy an effective one? To my mind, the answer to that challenge lies in an earnest effort at capacity building -- such as the capacity for free and fair elections, the capacity to pass just and wise laws, the capacity to mete out justice. In sum, we have to make democracy work for the welfare of our people.

But even after such capacity building, there are no guarantees that a country's attempt at democracy will succeed. The infrastructure of democracy is not unlike physical infrastructure: It is useful and indispensable but it does not work by itself. It takes human beings to make the infrastructure work.

It takes good citizens -- good men and women -- to make democracy work. Decent men and women who are imbued with civic discipline and high values -- such as the discipline and values of Islam.

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* This article was condensed from a speech given by Minister of Foreign Affairs, Hassan Wirajuda, in Jakarta on Dec. 6 at the second international roundtable on Islam and Democratization in Southeast Asia: Challenges and Opportunities.
Source: Jakarta Post, December 7, 2006
Visit the website at www.thejakartapost.com
Distributed by Common Ground News– Partners in Humanity.
Copyright permission has been obtained for publication.

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ARTICLE 5
Expulsion doesn't help
Benjamin Ward

London - Western European governments grappling with terrorism seem to have settled on a swift and convenient method to deal with the radical clerics seen to be inciting Muslim youths into acts of terror: they simply deport them.

Across the European Union, governments are moving to expel troublesome clerics said to preach hate, together with foreign terrorism suspects. The French interior minister, Nicolas Sarkozy, who advocates the expulsion of foreign residents convicted of participating in the recent rioting, has long endorsed deporting Islamist radicals deemed a threat to national security.

Sarkozy championed a change in French law last year that allows the authorities to expel foreigners who incite "discrimination, hate or violence against a specific person or group of persons," a measure designed to target radical Muslim clerics. France has expelled at least six imams since the law entered into force in July 2004.

France is not alone in its enthusiasm for expulsion. German states such as Bavaria are making use of a Jan. 1, 2005, federal law that allows them to expel legal foreign residents who "endorse or promote terrorist acts," or incite hatred against sections of the population.

In August, the British government broadened the grounds for deportation to enable it to remove persons who "justify or glorify" terrorism. Italy has expelled at least five imams since 2003, and an anti-terrorism law adopted on July 31, 2005, makes it even easier to do so.

Britain is determined to deport undesirables even when it means breaching international law. It has moved to deport terrorism suspects to countries where they face torture, based on "diplomatic assurances" from the receiving government, despite clear evidence that these promises are an ineffective safeguard against such treatment. London has already signed "no-torture" agreements with Jordan and Libya, and negotiations are under way with other governments with poor records on torture.

The danger of these measures is illustrated by the case of two Egyptians returned by Sweden in 2001 after "no-torture" promises from Cairo. There is credible evidence that both men were tortured in detention, despite visits from Swedish diplomats. In May, the UN torture committee found that Sweden had violated international law in the case.

The deadly attacks in Madrid and London underscore that Europe faces a real threat from terrorism. And expressions of hatred and violence, especially by those in positions of influence, are reprehensible. But deportation is not the answer. Terrorism is a criminal activity - far better to prosecute those involved than to export the problem. Where there is insufficient evidence, those who are deemed a threat can be put under surveillance, with appropriate judicial safeguards.

Why don't governments go this route? Building a case is painstaking work. And criminal defendants have rights. By relying on deportation - an immigration measure - governments can bypass the safeguards built into the criminal justice system.

In France and Germany, for example, lodging an appeal with the administrative court does not automatically suspend the expulsion, while the new rules in Italy mean people have the right to appeal only after they have been deported. The absence of an appeal before removal increases the risk that a person will be sent back to face torture. While some high-profile expulsion cases have been overturned on appeal, there is little doubt that deportation is far easier to achieve than conviction in a criminal court.

The ease with which the policy of deportation can be pursued, however, should not blind us to its costs. Deportation is a deeply counterproductive answer to terrorism. Muslim leaders across Europe have signalled concern that expelling Muslim clerics for nonviolent speech reinforces the view that Islam is synonymous with terrorism, and sends a signal to Muslim communities that they are not welcome in Europe, risking further alienation among the region's young Muslim citizens.

That is doubly true where a person is sent back to face torture, a practice that undermines more than half a century of efforts to rid the world of that moral cancer.

European Union leaders will meet in Brussels on Dec. 15 and 16 to discuss the EU action plan on counterterrorism, including ways to prevent the radicalization of young people and how to stop them from being drawn toward terrorism. They are right to do so. But deportation is likely to have the opposite effect. Far better to rely on the measures that helped make Europe a beacon for freedom around the world - a fair criminal justice system, tolerance for an open debate and respect for fundamental rights, including protection from torture.

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* Benjamin Ward is Special Counsel to the Europe and Central Asia division of Human Rights Watch.
Source: International Herald Tribune, December 2, 2005
Visit the website at www.iht.com
Distributed by Common Ground News– Partners in Humanity.
Copyright permission has been obtained for publication.

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Posted by Evelin at December 23, 2005 03:13 AM