It was decided to have an inter-faith dialogue between three principal religious communities of Myanmar i.e. Buddhists, Muslims and Christians. There are around 10 per cent Muslims in Myanmar and about 20 per cent in Yangon (formerly known as Rangoon). Yangon was formerly the capital but now it has shifted and it is largest trading and business centre now.

The interfaith dialogue was organized in Yangon, a middle sized beautiful city which is quite clean and green. Its population is around 6 million i.e. half the size of Mumbai. It is much less congested and has lot of greenery coupled with slow pace of life. Unlike Mumbai it has not high rise buildings the highest being two hotels with 25 stories other buildings have 5 to 15 floor. Muslims at one time were quite influential being mostly traders. Lot of Muslims had gone from Surat and still there is a beautiful Surti mosque.

Muslims in Myanmar are highly diverse. There are very few ethnic Burmese Muslims, most of them are migrants from different parts of India when Burma was a part of India. There are large number of Tamil, Gujarati and Bengali and Bohra Muslims and very few Urdu speaking Muslims since Urdu speaking are not in business. Now all Muslims speak Burmese language. These Muslims, in addition to their Muslim name have Burmese name too and publicly they are known by Burmese names only and within their own community by Islamic name. For example, a person has Chitko O-O as Burmese name and his Islamic name was Mohammad Nasiruddin. Similar tradition is followed by Thai Muslims too.

There are two famous spots in Yangon i.e. grave of the last Moghul King Bahadur Shah Zafar and the Biggest Buddhist Pagoda in Burma. I visited both the spots. Bahadur Shah Zafar’s grave is now inside a mosque built by Government of India. His original grave was found only when they were digging for the mosque in 1992-93. The British had buried him secretly and a symbolic grave – large in size – was built in another corner. Both the graves exist today. I visited Bahadur Shah Zafar Grave and paid my tribute to this great freedom fighter of India. It is very well kept.

The golden Buddhist pagoda is a famous place of pilgrimage for Buddhists and a great tourist attraction. It is indeed a complex of several big and small pagodas and is always crowded by visitors. Most of the buildings are gold plated which adds to the charm of the buildings. It is surrounded by lush green trees. One feels at peace in this complex. It is sad that in this country of Buddha human blood was shed and no one knows how many people died. Buddha’s compassion turned into Buddhists’ wrath. There is always a great distance between religious ideals and what followers do.

Burma, as pointed out before, has been a peaceful country and all three principal religious communities have been living peacefully there and going their respective ways. The military take over only aggravated the situation in Arakan, a western province. On the first day I reached in Yangon i.e. on 22nd June in a Christian educational institution. I elaborated on the concept of inter-faith dialogue and the intention behind it. Dialogue is to understand each other, not to convert the religious other to our point of view. To try to convert destroys the very spirit of dialogue, I said. I threw detailed light on the concept and need for dialogue between various religious and cultural communities.

However, we did not discuss the Rohingya Muslim situation but mostly concentrated on theory of inter-faith dialogue which also clarified many issues. Also, one could not visit the affected province as there is martial law and curfew and no one is permitted to visit the affected areas, not even the UN representative who had to go back as the Military rulers did not allow him to visit the affected areas. All I could do was to discuss the situation with people in Yangon itself. Yangon has many Rohingya Muslims.

I found that it was not correct to say that some Muslims raped a Buddhist girl. In fact what happened was that a Muslim boy was in love with a Buddhist girl and both married and eloped to avoid wrath of local people. Two other Muslim boys helped them in arranging marriage and also to elope subsequently. It was very similar to what happened in Jabalpur in 1961 when a Muslim boy fell in love with a Hindu girl and decided to marry and a strong rumour spread that he raped the girl and worst riots broke out in which more than 100 persons were killed and properties worth crores were destroyed.

Similar thing happened in Rakhian province also but this was only an apparent cause the real cause is of citizenship of Rohingya Muslims. I will throw some light on that little later. All three boys were arrested by the police and one who had married the Buddhist girl was killed in the police custody and many Rohingya Muslims believe that he was deliberately killed by torturing him.

What is much more shocking is that the two other boys who had helped the Muslim boy to marry have been sentenced to death and are to be executed. This can happen only under military dictatorship, not in a country where there is rule of law. How can such trial which condemns people to death within a few days be just? It takes months, even years, to complete the judicial proceedings to sentence someone to death. This proves how violative military dictatorship can be of human rights.

The immediate task before the Muslims in Burma is to save the lives of these two boys who are awaiting their execution. Hectic consultations were going on among the leaders as to what steps should be taken. I advised them to engage good layers and file an appeal in higher courts and also to approach human rights organizations like Amnesty International to launch a campaign.

The other question is of rendering relief. The Government does not allow anyone to take relief directly to the people but insists that the relief material be handed over to its agency and Muslims maintain they do not trust Government agency whether it will reach the affected people at all. Thus the Rohingyas are suffering. They are in urgent need of relief but there is no way relief by voluntary agencies can reach them.

The Rohingyas – those Muslims who live in Rakhian state (Arakan) have historically been coming to that state from outside as many Muslims had settled in other parts of Burma, especially in what was earlier known as Rangoon. Once this state Arakan was ruled by Muslims and hence many Muslims came over there and settled there. But the present Myanmar military government maintains that most of them are recent settlers and hence does not recognize them as citizens. But Rohingyas maintain that they have been there for more than 100 years.

It is very much like our Assam and Bangla Deshi problem. The AASU leaders had alleged that the Bnagla Deshis are settling in Assam and soon they will be in majority and ultimately Nelli riots took place in which around 4000 Bengali Muslims were killed. The Bengali Muslims also maintained that they were not recent infiltrators as alleged but have been there since thirties of last century or even earlier and they and their children have gone to Assamese schools.

The Military Government of Myanmar refuses to recognize them as citizens of Myanmar. But these Muslims maintain that until 1982 there was no problem and they used to vote in all elections and then they had five ministers in the national (Federal Cabinet) from Arakan state. Many of these Muslims are working in other countries like Saudi Arabia but do not have Burmese passport.

They illegally cross to neighbouring Bangla Desh and obtain passport from there (illegally) and go and work in the Gulf countries. It is estimated that there are nearly half a million Rohingya Muslims in Saudi Arabia on work permit. Many Rohingyas even in Yangon have no citizenship papers. They have been given identity cards but no passport. Thus this is main problem which is causing conflict.

The violence erupted because of this irritant the elopement of a Buddhist girl was merely a spark. The local Buddhists resent presence of Rohingya Muslims like the AASU resents so called ‘Bangla Deshi’ Muslims in Assam. India is at least a democratic country and the problem could be tackled democratically and hence Mrs.Indira Gandhi tried but it was neither to the satisfaction of Bengali Muslims nor to that of Assamese people. But in Myanmar there is no democracy and hence Aung Suu Kyi said we cannot resolve this problem unless there is democratic government and citizenship rights are decided according to the Constitution. At present there is no constitution at all. The problem thus will continue.
Asghar Ali Engineer

(Secular Perspective July 1-15, 2012)

In mankind’s  eagerness to ‘progress’ and ‘develop’ sight has been lost of the finite and delicate nature of planet Earth and of humanity’s place in it.  As a consequence the global climate has become unbalanced, leading to an increasing risk of floods, droughts and severe storms the world over.  In its 4^th Assessment Report, the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) projects that rising global temperature will cause increasing drought in mid-latitudes and semi-arid latitudes, increased water stress in many parts of the world, increased damage from storms, and coastal flooding affecting millions more people each year.

While opportunities to meet people from other cultures are increasingly common, meaningful learning doesn’t always follow and they don’t necessarily bring about positive shifts in attitudes and real social change.

Over the past 15 years at the London-based Three Faiths Forum (3FF), we have developed models for creating understanding between people of different faiths and beliefs, with a particular focus on students and young people. For the last three years we have been creating links between different faith schools – some 50 in total – through our Faith School Linking programme.

At a school linking event, two or three classes from different faith schools will meet in the morning. Participating students divide into small groups and begin a task, like creating an art project, or sharing a story. They look at each other with some curiosity and hesitation at first, as they meet people very different from themselves.

About 25 minutes into the session, a familiar hum starts circulating the room. It is young people being young people, chatting about what they have in common as well as exploring differences – and usually the differences that emerge are less about faith or beliefs and more about personality. In that moment, interfaith starts to become interpersonal.

One thing we have learned from this programme is that while encounters between young people from different communities can break down stereotypes and prejudices, it is not enough to simply bring people together and hope for the best. To be effective, the engagement has to be positive, genuine and sustained.

Good interfaith engagement often begins by increasing people’s understanding of what others are like – by not just teaching the facts about what they believe, but instead by creating opportunities to meet and explore questions together. Single events often lead to positive changes in attitude. Yet, they have proven in many cases to be less effective over the longer term and are more likely to reinforce stereotypes because they don’t allow enough time to truly understand other people’s stories. Sustained programming, on the other hand, provides an opportunity to develop deeper relationships based on trust.

To create a successful encounter, it is essential to use a neutral or shared space to serve as a “safe space”. Within this framework, the participants develop ground rules. Maintaining this environment will enable the students from each of the groups to cultivate feelings of respect and understanding.

There has to be a process of preparation before, and reflection after, the engagement takes place. It is important that students have the chance to learn something about the other students they will be meeting, and that they are given time and space to process what they have learnt afterwards.

One misconception about interfaith engagement is that it can weaken participants’ own beliefs. From our experience, and that of many other practitioners, rather than diluting the participants’ own beliefs, exploring the faiths, beliefs and cultures of others actually makes students feel more confident and secure in their own identity. In their post-engagement reflections, students often tell us that they have realised they needn’t be embarrassed to express their religion, and that they can share their beliefs with other people even if they belong to a different faith.

3FF is currently working in over half of the Muslim faith schools in London, as well as a wide range of other religious and non-denominational schools. Many of these schools have rarely, if ever, worked with an agency outside their own community. As such, the process of building trust is often a slow one. However, we have found that investing time – sometimes up to a year – is worthwhile in ensuring that schools are ready to commit to the programme for the long-term.

Once the link is established, ensuring genuine communication is a key contributor to a successful linking partnership. Any issues or challenges that arise need be communicated honestly and openly. In this positive and mutually supportive environment, religious leaders, teachers, parents and facilitators have the power to act as positive role models for students.

Direct encounters through programmes like Faith School Linking is one way to address the challenges posed by diverse societies. These engagements create a trusting space between communities that can be expanded to involve more people.

Children who participate take what they learn home and communicate their positive experiences to their friends and family, acting as vehicles to reach the wider community and becoming catalysts for wider positive change.

###

Stephen Shashoua

This article originally appeared here on CommonGround News

I recalled this dinner when I read about the malicious attacks launched by Rep. Michelle Bachmann and four other members of Congress on Obama Administration officials who are Muslim, claiming that they are advocating for the interests of the Muslim Brotherhood and a risk to our national security. Bachmann’s letters named Huma Abedin, long-time, trusted aid to Secretary of State Clinton, but they implied that many other officials were part of this broad “infiltration” of the American government.

Besides disgust at Bachmann’s guilt-by-association tactics reminiscent of the McCarthy period, I couldn’t help but feel a deep sadness, for all of the hard working Muslim American officials with whom I celebrated the Iftar dinner, and by extension, millions of Muslim Americans whose lives have been complicated by 9/11 and the wave of anti-Muslim sentiment that has swept over segments of our population. They wake up every day, do their best to be both good Americans and good Muslims, and even then, a woman with the most impeccable credentials imaginable can be accused by five members of Congress of being a disloyal traitor. And this incident comes on the heels of so many other – the Qur’an burning by a Florida preacher, opposition to mosques being built around the country, a host of state laws targeting Muslim holy law, a presidential candidate saying the Muslims could not serve in his cabinet, and large scale protests against a proposed Islamic center near Ground Zero in New York.

Perhaps, if I were Muslim, I would be heartened by the bi-partisan defense of Ms. Abedin that has been mounted, led by Senator John McCain. But still, I would be depressed by the weight of distorted thinking that fueled the Bachmann attack in the first place, most of which McCain and the others did not really address.

What is plaguing our society is the deep ignorance about Islam that conflates the entire religion and all those who practice it with much that disturbs us around the world, whether it be terrorism and other forms of political violence, the Iranian nuclear program, discriminatory treatment of women and minorities, and intolerance by some Muslims of other religions. Bachmann’s screed is laced with the paranoia that anyone who believes in Islam is religiously bound to the practices and political agenda of every Muslim organization, political party, or governing institution around the globe, many of which are antithetical to both U.S. interests and values. This is pure nonsense.

Bachmann’s logic is akin to saying that I, as a practicing Jew, hold the same worldview and am responsible for the actions of ultra-orthodox Jews in Israel who are discriminating against women and believe that the West Bank should be cleared of Palestinians and incorporated into Israel. But I have much more in common with the Muslim Americans with whom I shared Iftar dinner with last summer than I do with these Jews. We read the same holy texts and love our religion very deeply, but that is about where the commonality ends.

The American public needs to understand that Islam is as diverse as our other great religions – it is practiced by many in a manner that is consistent with democratic values of pluralism and tolerance and it is used by other to justify violence and discrimination in the name of religion. Determining where organizations affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood movement fit on this spectrum is a topic worthy of public debate. The violent terrorist organization Hamas is a spin-off of the Muslim Brotherhood. But many Muslim organizations in the United States that have had some linkages to the movement in the past operate firmly within U.S. law and our democratic traditions. We must demand that our leaders have the wisdom to make these types of distinctions.

The ultimate solution to this problem, like many others, is education and interaction. I hope that over the next month, Muslim Americans open their doors to many non-Muslims to share the experience of Ramadan. I am confident that non-Muslims who have the opportunity to observe the prayers and search for understanding, together with the social interaction (and eating!), that occur during these holy days will come to the same conclusion that I have. We Americans are pretty much all the same.

David Schanzer

This article originally appeared here on Huffington Post

Whilst Sri Lanka has tried to portray that there has been progress made on the ground largely in infrastructural development, critics have been quick to highlight the lack of tangible progress on reconciliation, in effect inertia on implementing internal recommendations for reconciliation, coupled with an ever weakening space for human rights, media expression and democratic freedom.   The recent resolutions at the UN Human Rights Commission in Geneva on Sri Lanka have been testimony to this type of thinking where analysts have not only been critical that progress has been slow on the ground amidst a decline in general rights that are deemed to be core to a functioning democracy, but they have also pointed to the need to keep this on the international agenda.

This is a debatable fact and the Government is not really willing to engage on any real discussion on the issue despite the occurrences as reported in the media of kidnappings and killings. A recent interview between the defence secretary and the BBC is testimony to the extremely sensitive nature of such discussions and criticisms.

It is also not helped by the ongoing international distractions that have prevented it from addressing some of the real pressing issues. Since the end of the war, there has been pressure from parts of the international community, supported largely by many Tamil  Diaspora organizations (some of them aligned with the former LTTE rump) for ‘accountability’ on the conduct of the end of the war and the ‘alleged’ deliberate killing of  Tamil civilians by the Sri Lankan army.

This vociferous call for ‘justice’ from one section of the Tamil Diaspora community which is blatantly anti State and only interested in one thing, which at the surface is not  any  comprehensive reconciliation solution for Sri Lanka,  has been unfortunately conflated with criticisms of the country’s current status.  This lack of subtle differentiation is convenient and means that any discussions critical of the state and its governance is immediately treated with suspicion that it is being done in support of the LTTE.  It doesn’t help as well that those who are often the loudest critics of the country and the government, themselves share platforms publicly with supporters of the LTTE and the creation of a separate Tamil state.

This suspicion from the government’s perspective of any criticism of its actions is somewhat unhealthy as it views with distrust anyone who disagrees with them.  It has also become unhealthy because the real pressing issues of reconciliation, good governance and so on, are overshadowed by trying to react to these allegations and calls for ‘accountability’.

A recent discussion in London at the Frontline club, bears testimony to this ‘Push Me – Pull You’ scenario affecting Sri Lanka.  Pitting the director of the Infamous Channel 4 documentary, with someone from Amnesty International and a representative for Tamils against Genocide,  against  a Government MP and advisor, the stormy discussion ended up rehashing old ground with no actual consensus of how things can move forward and two sides clearly polarised and reacting to one another.    As a consequence, we have a hurting stalemate with no real progress.

There needs to be a change of narrative that seeks a 3^rd alternative to the one that is currently being offered by both sides. The 3^rd alternative has to be one that starts to look at how the country (with all its constituent communities) can move forward.

The days of looking for black cat in the dark room is over because we now know that there is no cat there’

In the past, the war was a powerful unifying force, giving radical parties a platform for populist agitation and established politicians a diversion from their failure to address economic weakness, social concerns and pervasive corruption.  This shield is no longer there and the government will have to realize that there are some fundamental structural weaknesses affecting the country (in terms of bad governance, corruption and so on) which criticism off, doesn’t make one anti state.  Whilst the task of ensuring a political solution to the grievances of the minorities in a way that ensures that the country moves forward after more than 20 years of conflict, the government

will also have to realize that true reconciliation is a bottom up approach that requires acknowledgement of and engagement with all communities and their concerns.  This in particular means that there is a need to contain the extreme Sinhala Buddhist elements that seem intent on hammering the Sinhala nationalist identity home whilst playing into the hands of the detractors by affirming their criticisms of the country.  Recent incidents in Dambulla with no official reaction from the government have done little to dispel the perception of an erosion of rights for minorities in Sri Lanka.

The Tamil community mainly in the Diaspora have to also learn that by continuously appearing to repeat the narrative of organizations associated with the LTTE or even flying LTTE flags at protests and events such as what happened during the recent visit of the president to the UK,   they will do nothing apart from harden the opposition to them and the percepion that they represent ‘ an ltte rump’.  By flying the LTTE flags, these protestors show that they not only support an organisation that killed many of their own leaders and people, but was also responsible for the recruitment of child soldiers and the ethnic cleansing in the north.  This not bode well for any future discussion of reconciliation, accountability and justice for Sri Lanka.

There will also have to be a realisation that the narrative of the end of the war is not as clear cut as it seems.  If recent media reports are to be believed, a large part of the Tamil Diaspora are themselves responsible for the deaths of civilians in the conclusion of the war, when they refused to put pressure on the LTTE to release the human shields that they were holding.

So the narrative on Sri Lanka and about Sri Lanka has to change.  The Tamils genuinely believed that they were fighting for an identity and to take pride in their ability controlling their own affairs.  Though the LTTE ultimately betrayed their own people on what Tamil autonomy would entail, these

feelings cannot be blotted out by simply eliminating the LTTE but, they can be made irrelevant by the treatment Tamils (and other minorities) receive in the new Sri Lanka.  More importantly it cannot just be done by institutional measures to use Tamil language or to suggest some political autonomy but it will have to be done parallel at the grass roots level where communities need to start trusting one another and accepting them for their differences.

The building of relations of trust is important. By building these relations it is about forswearing the need for revenge and hatred but understanding that there has to be a way of stopping the cycle of unfair pain turning in one’s memory.  In order for this to happen, we have to acknowledge each other’s narrative and hear the other’s stories.  This iintellectual empathy ensures that people who are in conflict with each other will have to acknowledge that everyone has justified grievances and will also allow the disagreement of someone’s view, analysis or policy without doubting their sincerity and loyalty.

This is what we call restorative justice that does not punish nor does it condone evil and absolve the perpetrator of responsibility.  What it does is that it acknowledges that the past is the past and though it has to be honoured must not be allowed to become a ball and chain for the future.

As Ian Paisley said, ‘We must not allow our justified loathing of the horrors and tragedies of the past to become a barrier to creating a better and more stable future.  in looking to that future, we must never forget those who have suffered during the dark  period from which we are emerging’

Restorative Justice is needed not only on the ground but also with  the Diaspora of all communities, who have a lot of interest in what goes on in Sri Lanka and can be used to support post conflict community reconciliation.

Circumstances have now changed  and there is a real opportunity for great advances to be made for the country, not only in laying to rest the ghosts of the past, but to work towards a new political system and era.  Everyone is advocating for a change, tired of the cost that the conflict has inflicted upon the nation, tired of the corruption of the political system, tired of how Sri Lanka has become as a nation and society.

The question is whether communities and stakeholders will develop that 3^rd alternative to go beyond the hurting stalemate or whether we will be resigned to wishful dreams of what might have been.

Amjad Saleem

This originally appeared on Groundviews

Few stories, however, have managed to tick all the boxes for me as well as the story of Victoria and Abdul.  When I first came across the book Victoria & Abdul: The True Story of the Queen’s Closest Confidant, written by Shrabani Basu, it was an innocent interest in a historical story that made me venture in, but by the time I was finished, I was convinced that this was something greater.  It is what prompted me to convince our organisation to feature it in the launch of our new Cordoba Heritage Series, which kicked off on the 10th of May 2012.

Even for those of us who have at one stage or another studied Victorian history, this is a relatively unknown story.
In June 1887 two Indian servants were sent to Queen Victoria as a present for her Golden Jubilee. One was the 24-year-old Abdul Karim. Young Karim immediately caught the Queen’s eye and was rapidly promoted to become her Indian Secretary in 1894. He cooked her curries, became her Hindustani tutor and delighted the elderly Queen with his stories about India, especially as she had not visited the sub-continent despite having the grand title of ‘Empress of India’, and soon became the lonely monarch’s closest companion.
She honoured him with titles, gave him houses in Windsor, Balmoral and Osborne and extensive land in Agra. However, this relationship did not go over well within the strict hierarchical world of the royal household. They were not only opposed to the idea of a servant being catapulted into such prominence by the Queen’s side but were also scandalised by his race. At a time of great flux for the British Empire in India, the idea that there was an Indian advising the Queen ‘on Indian politics’ became unacceptable, and rumours started to circulate that Abdul Karim was passing the Queen inflammatory advice about India and that he was a spy leaking sensitive and secret foreign policy information.
On the eve of her Diamond Jubilee her family and courtiers even threatened to declare her insane in a bid to quash a potentially scandalous relationship.  Despite these objections, the Queen stood by Abdul Karim, even accusing her household of racial prejudice, till her last days, refusing to let him go. When she died in 1901, he was the final person to see her before she was buried and walked behind her funeral casket at her request.

However, with her death, Abdul Karim became an ostracised man and was immediately exiled back to India, with members of the royal household marching into Abdul Karim’s home, seizing all items bearing the royal crest and burning all his letters from the Queen.
He died eight years later at the age of 46, a largely broken man in virtual obscurity, a far cry from the times he was the most recognised member of Queen Victoria’s household. In the partition that followed the independence of India in 1947, his descendants were forced to move to Pakistan, where they were relatively unknown, and the story of Abdul Karim was forgotten from their history, until Shrabani found them whilst doing research for her book.  Now his mausoleum in Agra, India, is being cared for by his great-grandson and the story has since made the news in the UK in the past few weeks with an article in one of the tabloids, a documentary on TV, and the author’s sale of the movie rights for the book.

Victoria & Abdul is not only the story of an unusual relationship between the Empress of India and a humble servant, which flourished at a time when the British Empire was at its height, but it also allows us a glimpse at the narrative of the British Empire and their attitude towards their subjects, which provides the foundation for much of our heritage and legacy today.
Queen Victoria was definitely a pioneer in her fight for equality against racism and status. What makes the story even more interesting is that for the last 10 years of her life, her bodyguards and servants were all Indian Muslims led by Abdul Karim. The relationship between the crown and Islam could have been fractious given the socio-political contexts of Crimea and the Ottoman empire, yet Queen Victoria was adamant about how she would approach the relationship with her Muslim subjects and the support she would give those under her rule.  This is an important message that transcends the history pages for today.
As the UK prepares to celebrate the Diamond Jubilee of a reigning monarch for only the second time in its history, there are many similarities between that time and now.  Despite the difficulties that often transpired between the so-called ‘Muslim world’ and ‘the West’, the story of Victoria and Abdul shows that true friendship and loyalty transcend these boundaries of race, ethnicity and faith.  This is the heritage that we collectively have and must proudly propagate in the face of those who seek to be divisive.
This is what we at The Cordoba Foundation seek to do with our Cordoba Heritage Series, which is aimed at exploring, understanding and appreciating our common heritage and creative legacy to offer solutions to difficult questions of identity and belonging in today’s  ‘West’.  By exploring the shared history that acknowledges the many sources of Western culture in the East, we recognise the history of empire as a history that belongs equally to all its heirs, of every race, faith and nation. It is in doing this study that we can establish a firm and secure identity for Europe and its second- and third-generation migrants.

Amjad Saleem

This first appeared here on the BC Blog Our Shared Future

The evening was a rich cocktail for networking amongst senior people from the Football Association (FA), community leaders and journalists which bears testimony to the brilliant work of MWSF in establishing partnerships with some of the prominent mainstream organisations and individuals such as the Women’s England Football manager and the chief executive of the FA who was one of the prize givers. In it is a lesson for many Muslim organisations and community leaders who continuously strive for such recognition, but routinely fail in how to engage, develop and sustain such partnerships.

For more, please read here

The sudden disappearance and the equally unlooked for reappearance of Premakumar Gunaratnam and Dimuthu Attygala has compelled even the generally soporific opposition to bestir itself, and ask for a parliamentary debate on abductions.

In the second week of April, on Sinhala and Tamil New Year’s Day, seven Tamil houses in Dilithura (a village in Elpitiya, Galle) were looted and burnt, because one young Tamil man did not call a Sinhala soldier on leave, ‘sir’. Instead of arresting the perpetrators of this orgy of arson and looting, the police arrested two Tamil youths….

In the third week of April came the ‘mosque-fracas’ in Dambulla, a political thunderbolt in a month known for its massive thundershowers.

“A society that has been centred on protecting, maintaining and furthering the oppression of another people produces and indeed rewards hate. This is not unique to Israel or Israelis – it’s human.” Emily L Hauser (Daily Beast – 6.4.2012)

Ostensibly the issue was the ‘illegal construction’ of a mosque on a land belonging to a temple. If this is the actual bone of contention, it is very much a law-and-order issue which could and should have been settled via courts of law. But instead of seeking legal redress, a demonstration with anti-Muslim overtones was organised, demanding the immediate demolition of the mosque. The day before the demonstration the mosque was patrol-bombed. No perpetrators have been caught and “when contacted, police spokesman SP Ajith Rohana said he had no information about such an incident” (Sri Lanka Mirror – 20.4.2012).

The organisers decided to hold their demonstration on Friday, for maximum explosive effect. According to media reports, the demonstrators did not content themselves with demanding the removal of a supposedly unauthorised structure: “The protestors were calling for the demolition of the mosque claiming that Dambulla is a holy area exclusive to only Buddhists and that the mosque is situated in a sacred area” (Ceylon Today – 20.4.2012). If this contention is accepted and the mosque is demolished, it will create a deadly precedent which will embolden religious extremists across Sri Lanka. And ere long, Sinhala supremacists will insist on the removal of all non-Buddhist religious edifices from areas already declared ‘sacred’; or demand that more areas be declared ‘sacred’ as a prelude to removing Christian, Hindu and Muslim places of worship from them.

Was the mosque a new one? Was it constructed illegally? Does the land on which it stands belong to the temple? None of these questions can be answered because there was no impartial investigation, no due process, no judicial inquiry, no legal ruling. There was just mob power with a pinch of terrorism (what is the fire bombing of a place of worship but an act of terrorism?), a supine police and an accommodating government.

According to media reports, the Masjidul Khaira mosque “had been in existence since the 1960s and had been a place of worship for the Muslim residents in the area. Expansions and renovations to the mosque began recently….” (ibid). The demonstrators want the destruction of the entire mosque, and not just the recent extensions. They also intertwined the issue of ‘religious conversions’ with their anti-mosque campaign, thereby giving the issue a political provenance of national significance.

Is this just a flash in the pan incident? Or an omen, presaging another battle, against another minority?
.
Sinhala Supremacism and Rajapaksa Supremacism

Sinhala supremacism and Rajapaksa supremacism are two sides of the same coin. Most Sinhala supremacists support Rajapaksa Rule while the Rajapaksas accepts the core beliefs of Sinhala supremacism. Sinhala supremacists need the Rajapaksas to stay in the game while the Rajapaksas need Sinhala supremacism to give their Familial project an acceptable raison d’être. Without the Rajapaksa Siblings, Sinhala supremacism will cease being politically relevant and Sinhala supremacists will find themselves relegated to the fringes of the polity. Similarly without the politico-ideological cover provided by Sinhala supremacism, the Rajapaksa project will become revealed as nothing more than an attempt by a megalomaniac family to stay in power forever.

The relationship between Sinhala supremacists and the Rajapaksas is thus not just mutually beneficial; it is also a necessary precondition for the political survival and prosperity of both perties. But maintaining that relationship requires each side to make accommodations, to concede, to take a step back, to support, condone or at least refrain from opposing measures which are outside its agenda (and perhaps even somewhat deleterious to it).

The story of Gen. Sarath Fonseka is an excellent case in point. Gen. Fonseka was a Sinhala supremacist. Indeed he was the first Army Commander to advocate and justify a Sinhala First agenda openly. And as a true believer he played a key role, together with Mahinda and Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, in giving the Fourth Eelam War a Sinhala supremacist shape, tone and tenor. For most Sinhalese he was a hero second only to President Rajapaksa. The Rajapaksa-Fonseka fallout was not beneficial to the Sinhala supremacist cause; it was an internecine battle the Sinhala supremacists did not desire and could have done without. But pushed to make a choice between the Rajapaksas and Gen. Fonseka, the absolute majority of Sinhala supremacists opted for the former, forcing the latter to moderate his stance and locate himself in a more centrist position politically, in order to gain a degree of electoral relevance.

The Rajapaksas too would make minor concessions to satisfy their core-constituency, so long as these measures do not interfere with their political project or their personal lifestyle. Thus, in the contestation between a chief prelate and a Rajapaksa offspring on night races in Kandy, the Buddhist priest lost. But where the needs, interests, whims and fancies of the Family are not involved, the Rajapaksas would be quite accommodative towards Sinhala supremacists.

Though the relationship between the Rajapaksas and the Sinhala supremacists is of critical importance to both parties, it is not a relationship of equals. It is the Rajapaksas who are in command, who have the upper hand, who have the final say. In his epic poem Wavuluwa (The Saga of the Bat), the outstanding Sinhala poet of the previous century, Rapiel Tennakoon, contended that the relationship between a Sinhala ruler and Buddhism can take two forms: either the ruler uses Buddhism to further his own political project; or the ruler, as a true believer, genuinely tries to be guided by Buddhism. Mr. Tennakoon’s example for the second model is King Sirisangabo who gave up his kingdom and eventually his life to remain true to his Buddhist principles, a course of action the poet so obviously disapproves of. He contrasts this with the conduct of King Dutugemunu who “rode the (Buddha) sasana to destroy Tamil power” (“sasuna pita nega, Demala bala binda”). Here the ruler is the controller, the rider, the decider; religion is merely the vehicle he uses to achieve his temporal objective.

That is the model the Rajapaksas seem to be pursuing vis-à-vis Sinhala supremacists. SWRD Bandaranaike tried it first with ‘Sinhala Only’ but he was unable to control the forces he unleashed and was ultimately destroyed by them. Mr. Bandaranaike was a political liberal at heart, who took the opportunist’s path of using Sinhala supremacism for his electoral ends, hoping that he would be able to rein it in once in power. He failed spectacularly. The Rajapaksas are not political liberals; their despotic political vision dovetails perfectly with the revanchism integral to Sinhala supremacism. They both hark back to a past, to a county ruled by Sinhala monarchs with absolute powers. Thus Sinhala supremacism and Rajapaksa supremacism can and do work in tandem in general, even though when it comes to a choice, major or minor, Rajapaksa supremacism wins hands down.

Was last week’s Dambulla fracas a Sinhala supremacist project which the Rajapaksas acceded to, in a quid-pro-quo spirit? Or was it part of a Rajapaksa effort to create new conflicts and new enemies to divert Sinhala attention from growing hunger pangs? Or was it a bit of both, a project in which both sides have a stake, a project on which both sides can and do work together?

Educating the Minorities

Sinhala supremacism presupposes the acceptance of Sri Lanka as a land sacred to Buddhism with Sinhala Buddhists as its chosen people. According to this vision, minorities, including Sinhala Christians, are not co-owners of Sri Lanka but guests in it. They have no inalienable rights and their treatment depends on whether they accept their unequal status willingly or not.

Under Rajapaksa rule we are all subjects, including the chiefest of the Buddhist prelates. To be a good subject, Sinhala Buddhists have to submit to Rajapaksa dictats, willingly and unquestioningly. The ones who do not, like Gen. Fonseka, are immediately branded a traitor and hounded out of the patriotic community.

To be a good subject, non-Sinhala Buddhists have to submit to Rajapaksa dictats and accept Sinhala Buddhist dominance.

The Tamils have been put in their place. Now it is the turn of the Muslims.

Monsters cannot be appeased, because they are maximalist by nature; maximalism helps make a monster and no monster is complete without it. The Tigers began their bloody march towards sole-representative status in a gradualist manner, targeting one competitor at a time, always offering bogus excuses to justify their violence. So the TELO was attacked because it was pro-Indian and wallowed in criminality; the EPRLF was attacked because the EPRLF attacked first. There was always a ‘reason’, whether the target was an individual or an organisation. This approach prevented the Tamils from seeing the nature of the danger and creating a broad unity to defeat it in time. The future targets believed that they were safe so long as they avoided the mistakes attributed by the Tiger to the current victim. It was an illusion the Tiger did nothing to dispel and perhaps even encouraged deliberately. It was useful, because it effectively concealed a fundamental truth – that under Tiger rule no other organisation or entity will be permitted to exist, except in the capacity of a LTTE appendage, that total and unquestioning obedience to every Tiger demand will be the basic precondition for survival.

The Rajapaksas seem to be travelling in an analogous direction. A Sinhala supremacist, Rajapaksa supremacist Sri Lanka might be marginally more accommodative than a Tiger Eelam – it will not expel all minorities and kill/drive out all opponents, as the Tigers did. Minorities will be permitted to live so long as they accept their status as second class subjects who must submit to not just Rajapaksa dictats but also Sinhala Buddhist demands. Sinhalese will be granted certain limited rights so long as they obey the Rajapaksas.

That seems to be the lesson of April.

by Tisaranee Gunasekara

This article originally appeared here

Last week, during a book tour in London, I spoke to a large group of British Muslims on Islam and liberty. A few of the questions that I received from the audience indicated why discussion on this topic is much needed. “If the state gives the people the freedom to do what they want, then they will follow their temptations,” said one Pakistani gentleman. “That’s why the Saudi religious police, which you oppose, is a very good system.”

In return, I asked him why he relies on state policing, and not individual responsibility, to uphold the morals of Islam. “Isn’t is better to propose Islam rather than impose it,” I added, “since state dictates can lead not to sincere piety but hypocrisy?”

Such questions are crucial for the future of the Islamic world, and particularly the Middle East, in which the Arab spring is likely to create a new political space for Islamists – such as the An-Nahda of Tunisia or the extensions of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. Despite the dark picture drawn by some willful pessimists, including the Israeli prime ministerBinyamin Netanyahu, the entry of these Islamist parties to the democratic system is not a bad but a good step. (Their very exclusion has been the major source of the radicalisation within their ranks.) Moreover, these parties explicitly call for democracy, and not theocracies run by clerics.

However, as writer Fareed Zakaria warned aptly, there can well be illiberal democracies as well liberal ones. In other words, if individual liberty is not protected with constitutional liberalism, there is the risk of a majority coming to power via democratic elections and establishing a “tyranny of the majority”.

The Middle East heavily bears this risk, and one of the reasons is the authoritarian decrees in classical Islamic law (sharia) that incumbent Islamists might wish to impose. For example, the sharia bans apostasy and penalises it with capital punishment. A Muslim who decides to become a Christian, in other words, can be given a death sentence – as it tragically happened in recent years in Afghanistan or Iran. Sharia verdicts against blasphemers (real or perceived), non-practising Muslims, and women can also be very oppressive.

Of course, this problem has been discussed intensely over the years, especially in the past decade, and secularist Muslims have found the solution in denouncing the sharia. (The most extreme among them, such as the self-declared “infidel” Ayaan Hirsi Ali, even denounced Islam all together.) But while they have raised some applause in the west, such ultra-secularists have caused only more defensiveness and hence rigidity in the Muslim world.

A better solution might be not to denounce Islamic law, but to reform it. This is not as impossible as some think, for much of this law is not divine but “man-made”, and made according to pre-modern historical circumstances.

The ban on apostasy is good example. There is nothing in the Qur’an that justifies this ban, and like many other authoritarian decrees in the sharia, it comes from the post-Qur’anic literature, which reflects the political context of the early Muslim community. In other words, that community was almost constantly at war with lethal enemies, and apostasy in that context meant changing one’s side in battle – something which we still penalise as high-treason. In today’s world, however, apostasy is simply an exercise of religious freedom, and Muslims should see it as a right, not crime.

The more conservative Muslims who might find such calls for reform heretical should note that they were realised by none other than the late Ottoman empire, the latest Islamic superpower on earth. In the 19th century, the Ottomans engaged in an extensive modernisation effort, which included many political and legal reforms. Jews and Christians acquired the status of equal citizenship, the slave trade was banned, apostasy laws were rendered obsolete, a constitution was declared and an elected parliament was convened. To be sure, with all such reforms, the Ottomans did not abandon their respect for Islam. They only realised, as Ottoman statesman and Islamic scholar Ahmet Cevdet Pasha wrote, “as times change, laws should also change”.

In my new book on Islam and liberty, I draw upon such oft-forgotten historical and theological sources to argue that Muslims need not need to betray their faith in order to embrace liberal democracy. By accepting other people’s “freedom to sin”, and “freedom from Islam”, I even argue, they will be laying the right ground in which their own faith can flourish. For, as I said to that Pakistani gentleman in London, if there is no liberty, there is no genuine religiosity as well.

by Mustafa Akyol

This article originally appeared here in the Guardian Comment is Free

The fears about the future of religious minorities, particularly the Alawites, are exaggerated and are unsupported by evidence from modern Syrian history. Neither are they supported by the course of events during the revolution which erupted almost a year ago. There are no precise statistics on the distribution of religious minorities in Syria;however the percentage being widely quoted places Sunni Muslims at 79 percent of a total population of twenty three million. The Alawites constitute nine percent of the population and so too do the Christians, while the remainder is distributed among the other groups such as the Druze and Shi’a.

As the history of the Middle East is so important to understand the reality and in forecasting the future, historical readings give us no solid evidence that we are before a wave of religious sectarian cleansing. The notions of religious or ethnic purity are alien to the history of the region. Syria, like Iraq, Lebanon and other states in the region, contains a mosaic of cultural religious elements which areconsidered the most diverse in the world. Here, the great divine religions co-exist with subsidiary minorities, many of which have become extinct in other parts of the world, but remain present here.

Modern Syria has never witnessed primary religious conflict; tensions have always been the consequence of political manipulation and the sectarian factor was used as a means to exercise dominance and control. Tensions during the early 80s between Sunnis and Alawites were a result of the bloody assault launched by the regime of Assad’s father, Hafiz al-Assad, against the Muslim Brotherhood and resulted in widespread massacres in the Sunni city of Hama where many districts were flattened to the ground. It is totally unfair for the Alawite community to bear the blame of those assaults; it is the Ba’athist regime that has ruled Syria for the last 41 years that should solely bear that blame. Throughout that period, the regime remained keen on systematically entrenching the sectarian aspect for its own ends. Hence, Sunni officers were removed from the leadership of the army and the security agencies. Likewise, other minorities were marginalised and the regime depended almost completely on a section of the Alawite community to exercise its military and security control over the country.

The popular uprising currently taking place began in opposition to the regime of Bashar al-Assad because it is a corrupt and tyrannical regime. It did not begin, and throughout its course, has not assumed a sectarian dimension. In fact, some of its early leaders were Alawites, Christians, and Druze in addition to Sunnis. Just as the Syrian street presented an image of bravery, it also presented a spectacular image of consciousness. The slogan that was most widely and consistently repeated throughout the uprising was, “The Syrian people are one.” This contravened the official propaganda which was keen to ignite minority fears.

This does not mean that the efforts of the regime did not raise the sectarian polarization tension. For many of those whose homes were destroyed;whose sons were tortured in an unprecedented manner and whose families were butchered by the ‘Shabiha’ Forces [a group loyal to the regime most of whom are Alawites] before their eyes – many of these victims will not forget or easily forgive what they have suffered, and indeed there were acts of sectarian reprisals. But what is reassuring here is that the leaders of the revolution as well as religious leaders and scholars, regard these as isolated incidents which do not genuinely represent the ‘Syrian street’ in its various dimensions. This is an important point, because in the absence of a legitimate government, Sunni religious scholars and Alawite prominent figures and intellectuals assume the role of the most important authority in the relationship between the two sects.

In this regard, I refer to two important statements issued in February when Homs was being bombarded by the Syrian armed forces. The first statement was issued by five senior Sunni scholars in Damascus who enjoy wide respect and influence among Syria’s Sunnis. What was noticeable about these statements was that they called for caution to avoid falling into the sectarian trap, and strongly rejected any attempt to lay the blame for the regime’s crimes upon the Alawite community. In the second statement, which was issued by Alawite intellectuals in Homs and the coastal villages, they condemned the crimes of the regime and called for national unity to be strengthened. These statements and positions represent a continuing feature of the revolution which has been present from its very beginning. It also represents an important guarantee for the future against the occurrence of revenge attacks and sectarian killings.

In a new development, the Free Syrian Army recently announced the formation of its first Alawite squad which has named itself the Free Alawite Squad. The new squad issued a statement in which they called upon all officers and soldiers from the Alawite community to join them in the revolution. This is the first military defection of its kind from within the Alawites.

The most important problems facing the Syrian revolution does not spring from the nature of the revolution or its future course, but rather from the hesitancy of the international community; particularly following the position taken up by Russia and China, and ensuing feelings of helplessness, in the region and internationally, to stop the massacres against civilians. As for the revolution, it is called to continue along the same wise path: insisting on national unity, adhering to the inclusive values of the Syrian people, establishing a just democratic state, and then the criminal will face his punishment according to the rule of law -far away from the law of the jungle and the darkness of revenge.

Wadah Kanfer

Wadah Khanfar is president of the Sharq Forum, an independent think tank dedicated to developing long-term strategies for political development, social justice and economic prosperity of the people of the Middle East.

This article originally appeared here in the Washington Post