Fighting continues in Basra
Dozens of Iraqis have reportedly been killed and hundreds more injured in the violence [Reuters]
Heavy fighting has continued between US-backed Iraqi security forces and fighters from the Mahdi Army of Shia leader Muqtada al-Sadr as military operations in Basra entered a third day.
The clashes on Thursday came in defiance of a Friday deadline by Nuri al-Maliki for armed groups to give up their weapons or face "severe penalties".
The Iraqi prime minister was in Basra personally overseeing the operation that has sparked violence across the country, leaving more than 50 people dead and another 300 injured.
A fire also raged near Basra after a bomb exploded underneath an oil pipeline, Iraqi officials said.
Followers of al-Sadr, meanwhile, were staging protests in Baghdad to denounce al-Maliki's Basra crackdown.
In the capital's impoverished Sadr City district, demonstrators shouted: "Maliki you are a coward! Maliki is an American agent! Leave the government, Maliki! How can you strike Basra?"
Protests were also planned in the southern city of Amara. Al-Sadr has threatened to launch a civil revolt if attacks against his followers are not halted.
Crisis talks
The Iraqi government was holding talks with aides of al-Sadr in Najaf on Thursday to try to end the crisis, Liqa Ali Yassin, a member of Sadr's 32-member parliamentary bloc, said.
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On Wednesday, al-Sadr had demanded that al-Maliki leave Basra and send a parliamentary delegation for talks on resolving the crisis.
The violence began on Tuesday, when Iraqi troops launched operations to rid Basra of "lawless gangs".
Fighting then spread to al-Sadr's stronghold in Baghdad and other cities.
Iraqi sources told Al Jazeera that about 60 civilians were killed in a US air strike on the city of southern city of Hilla, although there were conflicting reports.
Iraqi security sources said that 29 people were killed.
The Basra operation extended north to Kut, where six members of the Iraqi security forces and six civilians were reportedly killed as troops fought militia street by street.
To the west in Diwaniyah, Shia fighters attacked a police station, killing two people.
In Tikrit, at least seven civilians were reportedly killed and nine others were wounded in US air strikes that destroyed two homes, according to Al Jazeera sources.
Three US employees were also seriously injured as rocket attacks pounded the fortified Green Zone in Baghdad.
Khalaf Haloul, a resident of Amara, told Al Jazeera by telephone that clashes between Iraqi forces and the Mahdi army were underway there as well.
He said mortars and rockets could be heard across the city. Mahdi Army fighters had deployed in all areas of the city in anticipation of military attacks, he said.
Convoy attack
Colonel Karim al-Zaidi, a police spokesman, said the convoy of Major General Abdul Jalil Khalaf, Basra's police chief, was hit by a suicide car bomber around 1am on Thursday [22:00 GMT Wednesday] as it passed through the streets of the city.
He said: "Three policemen were killed in the attack," adding that Khalaf was unharmed.
In video
The internal sectarian conflict in Iraq
Residents said the streets of the oil-rich city of 1.5 million people were deserted on Thursday and that shops and businesses were shut.
Before the latest fighting, Basra had become the battlefield for a turf war between the Mahdi Army and two rival Shia factions - the Supreme Iraqi Islamic Council (SIIC) of Abdel Aziz al-Hakim and the smaller Fadhila party.
The three factions are fighting to control the huge oil revenues generated in the province, which was transferred to Iraqi control by the British military in December.
Sadr's powerful movement called protest rallies for Thursday "to express no confidence in the Maliki government" in the wake of the Basra assault.
US military spokesman Major General Kevin Bergner told a news conference on Wednesday that 2,000 extra Iraqi security forces had been sent to Basra for the operation.
He said it was aimed at improving security in the city ahead of provincial elections in October.
"The prime minister's assessement is that without this operation there will not be any hopeful prospect of improving security in Basra," Bergner said.
Al Jazeera's James Bays, reporting from Baghdad, said the crackdown in Basra was meant as a show of strength by al-Maliki.
He said: "I think the prime minister is trying to put his stamp in this operation. No one expected that he would go to Basra."
"Al-Maliki wants to show that he is in control because in the past, he was seen as a weak, impotent leader
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Xinjiang: China's 'other Tibet'
By Lydia Wilson and Poppy Toland in Xinjiang, western China
Xinjiang's Uighur population are culturally more Turkic than Chinese [Reuters]
While reports of unrest in Tibet frequently grab headlines around the world, little attention is given to what several human rights groups have dubbed China's "other Tibet".
China's frontier to Central Asia, the vast western region of Xinjiang has in recent years seen escalating ethnic tensions and the imposition of a heavy military presence to suppress what Beijing says is a growing terrorist threat.
Covering an area more than three times the size of France, Xinjiang has long been an important crossroads of trade and culture.
For centuries its oasis towns were essential stopping points along the legendary Silk Road – a history that has left Xinjiang with a unique cultural legacy.
The region's indigenous population are the Uighurs - Muslims who are ethnically, linguistically and culturally Turkic, and worlds apart from their Han rulers, the ethnicity which dominates the rest of China.
"Before, looking for work was easy, but now they all want Han people, they don't want us"
Hislat, Uighur resident of Urumqi
After a chequered history with the Chinese Empire, Xinjiang's present incarnation as an officially "autonomous region" within the People's Republic of China began in 1949.
From Beijing's point of view, Xinjiang has always been a part of China.
But while the region has a history of domination at the hands of the Chinese, Beijing's claim overlooks long gaps where the region merged with Central Asian and Turkic states.
To this day, most Uighurs feel more culturally aligned with the Turkic peoples to the west, rather than Beijing to the east.
Conversely, and almost without exception, Han Chinese feel China's control of the region is perfectly legitimate.
'Chinese' Xinjiang
"I've talked to a lot of people in China about it and they just don't question it," says Michael Dillon, author of Xinjiang: China's Muslim Far Northwest.
"It's always presented as Zhongguo Xinjiang [Chinese Xinjiang] like Tibet is Zhongguo Xizang [Chinese Tibet] and so the assumption is that it's always been part of China."
Xinjiang's culture is rooted in its history as a
key junction on the Silk Road [GALLO/GETTY]
The region is of value to China due to "a very complicated mixture of political, economic and psychological reasons," says Dillon.
Among these, he says, are Xinjiang's bountiful natural resources and raw materials, and its strategic position buffering China from Russia.
But he adds, there is also the idea that "if Beijing doesn’t retain Xinjiang, it's a question of losing face, because Xinjiang is part of the motherland."
On top of that, Xinjiang also boasts something clearly lacking in the rest of China - space.
Accounting for one sixth of China's total area, Xinjiang not only produces 30 per cent of China’s cotton, but between the 1960s and mid-1990s it was also used as the test site for China's nuclear weapons.
Perhaps most unpopular with the Uighurs though is the use of their land to resettle huge numbers of Han from the overpopulated east of China.
Settlers rising
The numbers of ethnic Han settlers in Xinjiang has risen from well under half a million in 1953 to 7.5 million by 2000, and is rising fast.
According to the latest available figures, Han settlers make up around 42 per cent of Xinjiang's total population of 18 million, dictating a life that is culturally alien to the native Uighurs.
"There are more and more Han arriving here all the time," explains Tursuntay, a 45-year old Uighur man from the Xiniang border city of Ily.
"When I was young there were very few – this place belonged to us."
Critics say few Uighurs are benefiting from
Xinjiang's development [GALLO/GETTY]
Hislat, a 22-year old Uighur woman from Urumqi, the Han-dominated capital of Xinjiang, is also feeling the squeeze.
"Before, looking for work was easy, but now they all want Han people, they don't want us," she says.
"It's really difficult, but there's nothing we can do about it."
Arienne Dwyer, Assistant Professor of Linguistic Anthropology at the University of Kansas believes the situation in Xinjiang has got worse over the last decade.
"In the eighties and early nineties we saw quite a lot of Uighurs, particularly intellectuals and those in the northern area, who felt that the Chinese project in Xinjiang, though very far from perfect, was OK," she says.
"One thing that people of any ethnic group in Xinjiang would agree on with the central government is that economic development is a good thing. This is one change that has continued and has been a positive force all around."
However, what has followed says Dwyer are increasingly Han-focused policies where cultural activities are more tightly constrained and there is a stronger effort to bring ethnic minorities, particularly on the periphery such as Xinjiang, "into the Chinese fold".
This cultural tightening accelerated rapidly after the late 1990s and was characterised by increased police action, suppression of unrest and changes in language policy, increasing the use of Mandarin in schools at the expense of the Uighur language.
"From the point of view of the government, this is because Uighur pupils and university students don't have the adequate Chinese language skills to be competitive in the market economy," says Dwyer.
"But from the point of view of the Uighurs, this is a bold-faced attempt to be assimilated and it has not been viewed favourably."
Disillusioned
This is causing many Uighurs to feel disillusioned, angry and afraid of losing their distinctive culture says Dwyer, and as a result many, especially Uighur youths, are becoming more religious than their parents and there is a growing trend to study Arabic.
Dwyer does not believe claims from some Chinese officials that there is any connection with a radical Islamist movement.
Instead she sees such moves as "a statement of Uighur identity, to say 'we are fundamentally different from the Han Chinese'".
For Urumqi resident Hislat, religion is the root of her dissimilarities with the Han.
"We are very different from Han people," she says.
"They don't believe in anything, they have no religion. We only eat Halal foods, but they don't worry about that, they can eat anything. Also they don't pray, they don't know how. They don't believe."
Xinjiang's indigenous Muslims face tight
controls on their culture [GALLO/GETTY]
Although assertive about their identities as Uighurs and as Muslims, Hislat says she and her peers are in no fear of being radicalised.
Their culture and traditions are important to them, but they are living in a Han-dominated city and their lifestyles are accordingly secular.
They love American pop-stars, playing on the internet, going to discos and are prepared to be pragmatic with prayers in order to fit in with their work or study schedules.
But in the border cities Kashgar, Aksu and Ily, the atmosphere is different, with a much stronger military presence and more attempts by the government to control political activity and the Imams in the mosques.
Beijing says the security presence is needed to meet the challenge of separatist movements and conflicts which have plagued Xinjiang since its annexation.
These activities peaked in the 1990s, the time that the Soviet Union was breaking up.
At the time "the old Muslim states of Central Asia, like Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan were all becoming independent states," says author Michael Dillon, "and there was a strong feeling among certain parts of the Uighur population that they ought to have their own Uighuristan or Eastern Turkistan.’
More recently that sentiment in Xinjiang has subsided - or been suppressed.
Whether that is as a result of government measures, or a lack of reporting in the Chinese media is difficult to tell.
According to Dillon, it is a result of China's clever use of economic and diplomatic measures to dissuade its Central Asian neighbours from helping Xinjiang gain independence.
"I think this is one of the reasons that things have quietened down," he says. "The Uighurs have got no real external support
By Lydia Wilson and Poppy Toland in Xinjiang, western China
Xinjiang's Uighur population are culturally more Turkic than Chinese [Reuters]
While reports of unrest in Tibet frequently grab headlines around the world, little attention is given to what several human rights groups have dubbed China's "other Tibet".
China's frontier to Central Asia, the vast western region of Xinjiang has in recent years seen escalating ethnic tensions and the imposition of a heavy military presence to suppress what Beijing says is a growing terrorist threat.
Covering an area more than three times the size of France, Xinjiang has long been an important crossroads of trade and culture.
For centuries its oasis towns were essential stopping points along the legendary Silk Road – a history that has left Xinjiang with a unique cultural legacy.
The region's indigenous population are the Uighurs - Muslims who are ethnically, linguistically and culturally Turkic, and worlds apart from their Han rulers, the ethnicity which dominates the rest of China.
"Before, looking for work was easy, but now they all want Han people, they don't want us"
Hislat, Uighur resident of Urumqi
After a chequered history with the Chinese Empire, Xinjiang's present incarnation as an officially "autonomous region" within the People's Republic of China began in 1949.
From Beijing's point of view, Xinjiang has always been a part of China.
But while the region has a history of domination at the hands of the Chinese, Beijing's claim overlooks long gaps where the region merged with Central Asian and Turkic states.
To this day, most Uighurs feel more culturally aligned with the Turkic peoples to the west, rather than Beijing to the east.
Conversely, and almost without exception, Han Chinese feel China's control of the region is perfectly legitimate.
'Chinese' Xinjiang
"I've talked to a lot of people in China about it and they just don't question it," says Michael Dillon, author of Xinjiang: China's Muslim Far Northwest.
"It's always presented as Zhongguo Xinjiang [Chinese Xinjiang] like Tibet is Zhongguo Xizang [Chinese Tibet] and so the assumption is that it's always been part of China."
Xinjiang's culture is rooted in its history as a
key junction on the Silk Road [GALLO/GETTY]
The region is of value to China due to "a very complicated mixture of political, economic and psychological reasons," says Dillon.
Among these, he says, are Xinjiang's bountiful natural resources and raw materials, and its strategic position buffering China from Russia.
But he adds, there is also the idea that "if Beijing doesn’t retain Xinjiang, it's a question of losing face, because Xinjiang is part of the motherland."
On top of that, Xinjiang also boasts something clearly lacking in the rest of China - space.
Accounting for one sixth of China's total area, Xinjiang not only produces 30 per cent of China’s cotton, but between the 1960s and mid-1990s it was also used as the test site for China's nuclear weapons.
Perhaps most unpopular with the Uighurs though is the use of their land to resettle huge numbers of Han from the overpopulated east of China.
Settlers rising
The numbers of ethnic Han settlers in Xinjiang has risen from well under half a million in 1953 to 7.5 million by 2000, and is rising fast.
According to the latest available figures, Han settlers make up around 42 per cent of Xinjiang's total population of 18 million, dictating a life that is culturally alien to the native Uighurs.
"There are more and more Han arriving here all the time," explains Tursuntay, a 45-year old Uighur man from the Xiniang border city of Ily.
"When I was young there were very few – this place belonged to us."
Critics say few Uighurs are benefiting from
Xinjiang's development [GALLO/GETTY]
Hislat, a 22-year old Uighur woman from Urumqi, the Han-dominated capital of Xinjiang, is also feeling the squeeze.
"Before, looking for work was easy, but now they all want Han people, they don't want us," she says.
"It's really difficult, but there's nothing we can do about it."
Arienne Dwyer, Assistant Professor of Linguistic Anthropology at the University of Kansas believes the situation in Xinjiang has got worse over the last decade.
"In the eighties and early nineties we saw quite a lot of Uighurs, particularly intellectuals and those in the northern area, who felt that the Chinese project in Xinjiang, though very far from perfect, was OK," she says.
"One thing that people of any ethnic group in Xinjiang would agree on with the central government is that economic development is a good thing. This is one change that has continued and has been a positive force all around."
However, what has followed says Dwyer are increasingly Han-focused policies where cultural activities are more tightly constrained and there is a stronger effort to bring ethnic minorities, particularly on the periphery such as Xinjiang, "into the Chinese fold".
This cultural tightening accelerated rapidly after the late 1990s and was characterised by increased police action, suppression of unrest and changes in language policy, increasing the use of Mandarin in schools at the expense of the Uighur language.
"From the point of view of the government, this is because Uighur pupils and university students don't have the adequate Chinese language skills to be competitive in the market economy," says Dwyer.
"But from the point of view of the Uighurs, this is a bold-faced attempt to be assimilated and it has not been viewed favourably."
Disillusioned
This is causing many Uighurs to feel disillusioned, angry and afraid of losing their distinctive culture says Dwyer, and as a result many, especially Uighur youths, are becoming more religious than their parents and there is a growing trend to study Arabic.
Dwyer does not believe claims from some Chinese officials that there is any connection with a radical Islamist movement.
Instead she sees such moves as "a statement of Uighur identity, to say 'we are fundamentally different from the Han Chinese'".
For Urumqi resident Hislat, religion is the root of her dissimilarities with the Han.
"We are very different from Han people," she says.
"They don't believe in anything, they have no religion. We only eat Halal foods, but they don't worry about that, they can eat anything. Also they don't pray, they don't know how. They don't believe."
Xinjiang's indigenous Muslims face tight
controls on their culture [GALLO/GETTY]
Although assertive about their identities as Uighurs and as Muslims, Hislat says she and her peers are in no fear of being radicalised.
Their culture and traditions are important to them, but they are living in a Han-dominated city and their lifestyles are accordingly secular.
They love American pop-stars, playing on the internet, going to discos and are prepared to be pragmatic with prayers in order to fit in with their work or study schedules.
But in the border cities Kashgar, Aksu and Ily, the atmosphere is different, with a much stronger military presence and more attempts by the government to control political activity and the Imams in the mosques.
Beijing says the security presence is needed to meet the challenge of separatist movements and conflicts which have plagued Xinjiang since its annexation.
These activities peaked in the 1990s, the time that the Soviet Union was breaking up.
At the time "the old Muslim states of Central Asia, like Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan were all becoming independent states," says author Michael Dillon, "and there was a strong feeling among certain parts of the Uighur population that they ought to have their own Uighuristan or Eastern Turkistan.’
More recently that sentiment in Xinjiang has subsided - or been suppressed.
Whether that is as a result of government measures, or a lack of reporting in the Chinese media is difficult to tell.
According to Dillon, it is a result of China's clever use of economic and diplomatic measures to dissuade its Central Asian neighbours from helping Xinjiang gain independence.
"I think this is one of the reasons that things have quietened down," he says. "The Uighurs have got no real external support
Five years on: Iraq war voices
Five years after the invasion, violence still kills scores of Iraqis daily [GALLO/GETTY]
The war in Iraq has now entered its fifth year and the violence shows no signs of abating.
Voices from the Iraq war
'Yasmin' is an Iraqi woman who fled the violence and now lives in Sweden
'Mohammed' is an Iraqi dentist who lives in Baghdad
Camilo Mejia is a former US soldier and Iraq war veteran
Tom Basile is a former spokesman for the CPA, the US-run transitional government in Iraq post-invasion
Roland Huguenin-Benjamin is a former Red Cross spokesman who worked in Iraq during the invasion
Click on the names above to read their stories
As part of its special coverage of the fifth anniversary of the conflict, Al Jazeera spoke to five people who all experienced the conflict and its aftermath.
First, Al Jazeera spoke to two Iraqis - one who remains in the capital, Baghdad and one who has since fled to Europe - and asked them to share their memories of the war, what has happened to them in the five years since, and where they see the future of Iraq.
Both have requested anonymity, fearing reprisals.
Al Jazeera also spoke to a European aid worker who worked for the Red Cross during the US-led invasion, a former US soldier turned anti-war activist, and a US former member of the Coalition Provisional Authority, which governed Iraq in the aftermath of the invasion.
Al Jazeera asked for their experiences of the war and its aftermath from their perspectives, and what they feel the future holds for Iraq and its people.
Click on their names on the right hand side to read their stories
Five years after the invasion, violence still kills scores of Iraqis daily [GALLO/GETTY]
The war in Iraq has now entered its fifth year and the violence shows no signs of abating.
Voices from the Iraq war
'Yasmin' is an Iraqi woman who fled the violence and now lives in Sweden
'Mohammed' is an Iraqi dentist who lives in Baghdad
Camilo Mejia is a former US soldier and Iraq war veteran
Tom Basile is a former spokesman for the CPA, the US-run transitional government in Iraq post-invasion
Roland Huguenin-Benjamin is a former Red Cross spokesman who worked in Iraq during the invasion
Click on the names above to read their stories
As part of its special coverage of the fifth anniversary of the conflict, Al Jazeera spoke to five people who all experienced the conflict and its aftermath.
First, Al Jazeera spoke to two Iraqis - one who remains in the capital, Baghdad and one who has since fled to Europe - and asked them to share their memories of the war, what has happened to them in the five years since, and where they see the future of Iraq.
Both have requested anonymity, fearing reprisals.
Al Jazeera also spoke to a European aid worker who worked for the Red Cross during the US-led invasion, a former US soldier turned anti-war activist, and a US former member of the Coalition Provisional Authority, which governed Iraq in the aftermath of the invasion.
Al Jazeera asked for their experiences of the war and its aftermath from their perspectives, and what they feel the future holds for Iraq and its people.
Click on their names on the right hand side to read their stories
Saturday, March 15, 2008
Qatar opens first church, quietly
By Shabina S. Khatri in Doha
The Church of Our Lady of the Rosary will serve Doha's 150,000 Catholics [Omar Chatriwala]
When Regina Setiadi moved from Indonesia to the Gulf last year, she left her Bible, crucifix and rosary behind.
"I never think that here in [the] Middle East there's a church," the 37-year-old Catholic, who now lives in Doha, Qatar, told Al Jazeera. "I thought we have to pray secretly at home."
Or in schools. Or rented halls.
But now, after decades of worshipping in borrowed spaces, Qatar's growing Christian community is celebrating - albeit quietly - the opening of the country's first church since pre-Islamic times.
For Christians, the milestone is a validation of their growing community, comprised of expatriate workers mainly from South Asia and the Philippines. For others, the church symbolises a step forward for rapidly developing Qatar, a tiny oil-rich country bidding for the 2016 Olympics.
"The church will send a positive message to the world," Abdullah bin Hamad al-Attiyah, Qatar's minister of energy and industry, told reporters on Friday during the unveiling of the complex.
But because some say the church flies in the face of Qatar's Islamic values, religious leaders and government officials have been cautious about trumpeting the news too loudly.
"You have to respect the sensitivities of the country," Reverend Bill Schwartz, an American priest fluent in Arabic, told Al Jazeera. "The people here have no cultural foundation to perceive Christianity. I don't think it's a negative thing – [the exposure] just hasn't been there.
Large and unassuming
The Church of Our Lady of the Rosary, to be consecrated on Saturday and open for Easter services on Sunday, will serve Doha's Catholic community, which comprises 90 per cent of the city's 150,000 and growing Christian expatriate population.
"I feel that being a Muslim country, they should not allow a church to be here"
Nabila Rahman, elementary school teacher in Doha
Construction of buildings for four other groups - Anglican, Coptic and the Greek Orthodox communities, as well as an inter-denominational centre where 11 Indian churches will converge under a single roof - is also under way, says Schwartz, who is involved in the Anglican Church of the Epiphany effort.
When completed, the complex will be one of the largest Christian structures in the Gulf, Naim Fouad Wakin, the project contractor, told Al Jazeera.
The $20m Catholic church, which seats 2,700, is located in the southern outskirts of the city on land donated by Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, Qatar's emir, and leased for a nominal fee.
Though it sits amid mounds of uneven gravel and sand, Schwartz predicted rapid development within the next two years. Around 7,000 housing units are going up in the area, he said.
Because of the controversy surrounding the church's opening, security patrols are to monitor the complex for months to come.
In keeping with government requests, the building's exterior bears no crosses, steeple or church bells. The interior is similarly cautious, awash in soft blues and yellows, subtly airbrushed Biblical imagery - including a few crucifixes - and understated stained-glass windows.
"We have complied and intend to keep complying with every regulation set by the government," Archbishop Paul Hinder, the Apostolic Vicar of Arabia and the senior Roman Catholic cleric in the region, said on Friday.
'Not OK'
But the idea of an official space for Christians, however unassuming, does not sit well with some Doha residents.
"I'm not OK with it," Nabila Rahman, 37, told Al Jazeera after Friday prayers in a Doha mosque. "I feel that being a Muslim country, they should not allow a church to be here," the Sri Lankan elementary school teacher added.
The complete church complex is expected to be
one of the largest in the Gulf [Omar Chatriwala]
Khalifa Saleh, a 24-year-old Qatari, held the opposite perspective, commending the government for helping a religious minority feel more welcome in the country.
"This is a great step towards respect and tolerance. Many Christian expatriates have moved to Qatar in search for a better future. Their hard work and dedication to their work helps give Qatar a brighter future and I thank them for that."
He said that only a minority of nationals, which account for less than a third of Qatar's one million residents, are upset about the church.
"Those people have to be ignored. We ask for a mosque in England, so why can't people ask for a church in Qatar? As long as the religion does not interfere with the state or not impose itself on other Muslims, I see no problem at all."
Indeed, religious leaders have promised not to proselytise. And because it is illegal in Qatar for Muslims to convert to other religions, the church must handle any natives interested in Christianity with extra care, Schwartz said.
If Muslims were to come to him inquiring about his faith, he said, "I would be expected to turn them away."
A heart's delight
With the opening of Our Lady of the Rosary, Saudi Arabia remains the only Gulf state to ban churches and open worship by non-Muslims.
Those who oppose churches in the Gulf often quote the Prophet Muhammed as saying "no two religions will come together in the Arabian peninsula".
But Abdul Hamid al-Ansari, former dean of the sharia (Islamic law) school at Qatar University and a vocal advocate of Doha's new church, offered another interpretation.
"This does not mean that churches should be banned in Qatar because religious scholars believe it applies to the Hijaz - specifically Mecca and Medina," Islam's two holiest cities in Saudi Arabia, Ansari said in a local newspaper article.
"Let's all welcome the presence of churches in Qatar ... as a demonstration of Islamic tolerance and human brotherhood."
In Kuwait, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates, churches were seen as one way to attract more foreign workers. Hinder said he expects Doha's churches to do the same.
"When the spiritual needs of people are met, they will be more happy at work," he said. "This new building is a delight for our hearts
By Shabina S. Khatri in Doha
The Church of Our Lady of the Rosary will serve Doha's 150,000 Catholics [Omar Chatriwala]
When Regina Setiadi moved from Indonesia to the Gulf last year, she left her Bible, crucifix and rosary behind.
"I never think that here in [the] Middle East there's a church," the 37-year-old Catholic, who now lives in Doha, Qatar, told Al Jazeera. "I thought we have to pray secretly at home."
Or in schools. Or rented halls.
But now, after decades of worshipping in borrowed spaces, Qatar's growing Christian community is celebrating - albeit quietly - the opening of the country's first church since pre-Islamic times.
For Christians, the milestone is a validation of their growing community, comprised of expatriate workers mainly from South Asia and the Philippines. For others, the church symbolises a step forward for rapidly developing Qatar, a tiny oil-rich country bidding for the 2016 Olympics.
"The church will send a positive message to the world," Abdullah bin Hamad al-Attiyah, Qatar's minister of energy and industry, told reporters on Friday during the unveiling of the complex.
But because some say the church flies in the face of Qatar's Islamic values, religious leaders and government officials have been cautious about trumpeting the news too loudly.
"You have to respect the sensitivities of the country," Reverend Bill Schwartz, an American priest fluent in Arabic, told Al Jazeera. "The people here have no cultural foundation to perceive Christianity. I don't think it's a negative thing – [the exposure] just hasn't been there.
Large and unassuming
The Church of Our Lady of the Rosary, to be consecrated on Saturday and open for Easter services on Sunday, will serve Doha's Catholic community, which comprises 90 per cent of the city's 150,000 and growing Christian expatriate population.
"I feel that being a Muslim country, they should not allow a church to be here"
Nabila Rahman, elementary school teacher in Doha
Construction of buildings for four other groups - Anglican, Coptic and the Greek Orthodox communities, as well as an inter-denominational centre where 11 Indian churches will converge under a single roof - is also under way, says Schwartz, who is involved in the Anglican Church of the Epiphany effort.
When completed, the complex will be one of the largest Christian structures in the Gulf, Naim Fouad Wakin, the project contractor, told Al Jazeera.
The $20m Catholic church, which seats 2,700, is located in the southern outskirts of the city on land donated by Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, Qatar's emir, and leased for a nominal fee.
Though it sits amid mounds of uneven gravel and sand, Schwartz predicted rapid development within the next two years. Around 7,000 housing units are going up in the area, he said.
Because of the controversy surrounding the church's opening, security patrols are to monitor the complex for months to come.
In keeping with government requests, the building's exterior bears no crosses, steeple or church bells. The interior is similarly cautious, awash in soft blues and yellows, subtly airbrushed Biblical imagery - including a few crucifixes - and understated stained-glass windows.
"We have complied and intend to keep complying with every regulation set by the government," Archbishop Paul Hinder, the Apostolic Vicar of Arabia and the senior Roman Catholic cleric in the region, said on Friday.
'Not OK'
But the idea of an official space for Christians, however unassuming, does not sit well with some Doha residents.
"I'm not OK with it," Nabila Rahman, 37, told Al Jazeera after Friday prayers in a Doha mosque. "I feel that being a Muslim country, they should not allow a church to be here," the Sri Lankan elementary school teacher added.
The complete church complex is expected to be
one of the largest in the Gulf [Omar Chatriwala]
Khalifa Saleh, a 24-year-old Qatari, held the opposite perspective, commending the government for helping a religious minority feel more welcome in the country.
"This is a great step towards respect and tolerance. Many Christian expatriates have moved to Qatar in search for a better future. Their hard work and dedication to their work helps give Qatar a brighter future and I thank them for that."
He said that only a minority of nationals, which account for less than a third of Qatar's one million residents, are upset about the church.
"Those people have to be ignored. We ask for a mosque in England, so why can't people ask for a church in Qatar? As long as the religion does not interfere with the state or not impose itself on other Muslims, I see no problem at all."
Indeed, religious leaders have promised not to proselytise. And because it is illegal in Qatar for Muslims to convert to other religions, the church must handle any natives interested in Christianity with extra care, Schwartz said.
If Muslims were to come to him inquiring about his faith, he said, "I would be expected to turn them away."
A heart's delight
With the opening of Our Lady of the Rosary, Saudi Arabia remains the only Gulf state to ban churches and open worship by non-Muslims.
Those who oppose churches in the Gulf often quote the Prophet Muhammed as saying "no two religions will come together in the Arabian peninsula".
But Abdul Hamid al-Ansari, former dean of the sharia (Islamic law) school at Qatar University and a vocal advocate of Doha's new church, offered another interpretation.
"This does not mean that churches should be banned in Qatar because religious scholars believe it applies to the Hijaz - specifically Mecca and Medina," Islam's two holiest cities in Saudi Arabia, Ansari said in a local newspaper article.
"Let's all welcome the presence of churches in Qatar ... as a demonstration of Islamic tolerance and human brotherhood."
In Kuwait, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates, churches were seen as one way to attract more foreign workers. Hinder said he expects Doha's churches to do the same.
"When the spiritual needs of people are met, they will be more happy at work," he said. "This new building is a delight for our hearts
Scholarships not reaching India's minorities
Scholarships not reaching India's minorities
Posted March 13th, 2008 by Mudassir RizwanIndian Muslim By Rajeev Ranjan Roy, IANS
New Delhi : Only 5,588 merit-cum-means scholarships were given to India's minority community students for pursuing professional and technical courses for 2007-08 even though the allowed quota was 20,000, official data shows.
The disparity has prompted Sikh, Buddhist, Christian and Muslim leaders to demand a mechanism to monitor the implementation of the new scholarship scheme, which was approved by the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) in June last year.
Against an entitlement of 840 merit-cum-means scholarships for Buddhists given by the ministry of minority affairs, only five students - two from Orisssa, and one each from Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh and Assam - got scholarships.
Muslim and Christian students were given 4,344 and 1,189 scholarships respectively in 35 states and union territories as against the entitlement of 14,585 and 2,540 scholarships for the two communities.
The number of Sikh beneficiaries stood at 50 as against a quota of 2,540 for the community.
"The government must put in place an effective monitoring mechanism to ensure that the benefits of scholarships do reach the targeted groups. The whole purpose will be defeated if implementation is not ensured at the ground level," Mahendra Pratap Rana, director, Delhi-based Buddha Smriti Sansthan (BSS), told IANS.
Experts believe lack of awareness among minority community students and bureaucratic hurdles are holding back the scholarships for which applications are processed at the state level.
Minority Affairs Minister A.R. Antulay has informed the Rajya Sabha, parliament's upper house, in a written statement that only 5,588 scholarships worth Rs.140 million were given in 11 states in 2007-08 - Karnataka (785), Orissa (81), Kerala (1,405), Tamil Nadu (753), Bihar (1,444), Madhya Pradesh (393), Goa (29), Chandigarh (5), Himachal Pradesh (11), Assam (504) and Delhi (178).
Religious minorities make up about 14 percent of India's billion plus population.
"There is a need to create more awareness among targeted groups about the scheme. At the same time, the government must ensure that states promptly process applications. It is extremely saddening if poor students do not avail of the benefits of a scholarship," Lama Chosphel Zotpa, a senior member of the National Commission for Minorities (NCM), told IANS.
Many community leaders recommend setting up independent nodal agencies in all states to supervise the implementation of educational schemes meant for the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, other backward classes and minorities.
"There are so many scholarship schemes that the government cannot ensure their effective implementation without putting in place a dedicated mechanism. It is easy to have scholarships for the poor, but difficult to ensure that benefits percolate to them," said N. Paul Divakar, convenor, National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights (NCDHR).
The scheme is open only for students whose family's annual income from all sources does not exceed Rs.250,000. The government pays the fee for the recognised professional and technical courses for every beneficiary apart from a Rs.10,000 per annum maintenance allowance for the hostellers and Rs.5,000 for day scholars.
"The government should evolve a fine-tuned mechanism in consultation with the university administration instead of depending upon states for implanting such schemes. If such an arrangement is not made, I am uncertain if the new scheme will not meet the fate of other schemes where nobody knows how useful such schemes are," Mohammad Shafi Qureshi, chairman, NCM, said.
Ministry officials, however, are not discouraged.
"It is a new scheme approved by the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) only June 21 last year. It is going to be successful, and we hope to achieve the target in the coming fiscal. The gap in the target for 2007-08 will also be met in the next fiscal," a ministry official, requesting anonymity, said
Posted March 13th, 2008 by Mudassir RizwanIndian Muslim By Rajeev Ranjan Roy, IANS
New Delhi : Only 5,588 merit-cum-means scholarships were given to India's minority community students for pursuing professional and technical courses for 2007-08 even though the allowed quota was 20,000, official data shows.
The disparity has prompted Sikh, Buddhist, Christian and Muslim leaders to demand a mechanism to monitor the implementation of the new scholarship scheme, which was approved by the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) in June last year.
Against an entitlement of 840 merit-cum-means scholarships for Buddhists given by the ministry of minority affairs, only five students - two from Orisssa, and one each from Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh and Assam - got scholarships.
Muslim and Christian students were given 4,344 and 1,189 scholarships respectively in 35 states and union territories as against the entitlement of 14,585 and 2,540 scholarships for the two communities.
The number of Sikh beneficiaries stood at 50 as against a quota of 2,540 for the community.
"The government must put in place an effective monitoring mechanism to ensure that the benefits of scholarships do reach the targeted groups. The whole purpose will be defeated if implementation is not ensured at the ground level," Mahendra Pratap Rana, director, Delhi-based Buddha Smriti Sansthan (BSS), told IANS.
Experts believe lack of awareness among minority community students and bureaucratic hurdles are holding back the scholarships for which applications are processed at the state level.
Minority Affairs Minister A.R. Antulay has informed the Rajya Sabha, parliament's upper house, in a written statement that only 5,588 scholarships worth Rs.140 million were given in 11 states in 2007-08 - Karnataka (785), Orissa (81), Kerala (1,405), Tamil Nadu (753), Bihar (1,444), Madhya Pradesh (393), Goa (29), Chandigarh (5), Himachal Pradesh (11), Assam (504) and Delhi (178).
Religious minorities make up about 14 percent of India's billion plus population.
"There is a need to create more awareness among targeted groups about the scheme. At the same time, the government must ensure that states promptly process applications. It is extremely saddening if poor students do not avail of the benefits of a scholarship," Lama Chosphel Zotpa, a senior member of the National Commission for Minorities (NCM), told IANS.
Many community leaders recommend setting up independent nodal agencies in all states to supervise the implementation of educational schemes meant for the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, other backward classes and minorities.
"There are so many scholarship schemes that the government cannot ensure their effective implementation without putting in place a dedicated mechanism. It is easy to have scholarships for the poor, but difficult to ensure that benefits percolate to them," said N. Paul Divakar, convenor, National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights (NCDHR).
The scheme is open only for students whose family's annual income from all sources does not exceed Rs.250,000. The government pays the fee for the recognised professional and technical courses for every beneficiary apart from a Rs.10,000 per annum maintenance allowance for the hostellers and Rs.5,000 for day scholars.
"The government should evolve a fine-tuned mechanism in consultation with the university administration instead of depending upon states for implanting such schemes. If such an arrangement is not made, I am uncertain if the new scheme will not meet the fate of other schemes where nobody knows how useful such schemes are," Mohammad Shafi Qureshi, chairman, NCM, said.
Ministry officials, however, are not discouraged.
"It is a new scheme approved by the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) only June 21 last year. It is going to be successful, and we hope to achieve the target in the coming fiscal. The gap in the target for 2007-08 will also be met in the next fiscal," a ministry official, requesting anonymity, said
Aligarh Muslim University gives itself pan-India character
Posted March 11th, 2008 by Mudassir RizwanIndian Muslim By Brij Khandelwal, IANS
Aligarh : The Aligarh Muslim University is trying to make itself compatible with the changing times and needs of the society despite resentment from within.
Vice-chancellor P.K. Abdul Azis is keen that the institution joins the ranks of the best in the field of education.
The vice chancellor told the IANS that a proposal to open five new centres of the university to give it an identifiable all-India character is awaiting clearance from the Ministry of Human Resources Development (HRD), while four examinations centres have started functioning this year.
The University Grants Commission (UGC) has also given Rs.70 million to the university's technical college, the Zakir Hussain College of Engineering and Technology (ZHCET), to upgrade it to the level of the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs).
The money, according to university officials, will give a fillip to the university's initiatives.
M.T. Ahmad, principal, ZHCET, said the HRD ministry has identified the college as one of the seven institutions to be upgraded into an IIT.
The university hopes that its project to upgrade ZHCET will resume as soon as the ministry and the University Grants Commission resume funding under the 11th Plan.
The university has set up four new centres to conduct entrance examinations across the country to give it a pan-India status. The move, though welcomed by almost everybody, was opposed by a section of teachers who alleged that they were not taken into confidence.
The vice-chancellor will meet the teachers March 16 to discuss the initiatives. He denied allegations by some teachers that the university was not following standard democratic procedures to arrive at policy decisions.
"Many teachers feel that the new centres will dilute the hold of the academic community and perhaps lower the prestige of the university," said a leader of the teaching staff.
Early January, the executive council of AMU decided to start four admission test centres at Bhopal, Kolkata, Kozhikode and Pune.
The vice-chancellor appointed four committees comprising deans of faculties, members of the executive council and senior teachers of the university to visit these centres to assess the facilities available, security measures to be adopted and ascertain the reputation of institutions where admission tests were to be conducted.
The university management said at that time that the initiative was aimed at attracting meritorious students to AMU and to strengthen its all-India character.
But most of the teachers do not seem to be in favour of this decentralisation process. "The teachers would be at the mercy of the management and the inconvenient ones would be transferred from one place to the other," a section of the teachers feared.
Mustafa Zaidi, one of the leaders of the teaching community, told IANS: "We are not opposed to changes or initiatives per se, but we would like democratic procedures followed in letter and spirit. The AMU has a well laid out democratic system, the decisions on policy matters have to go from bottom to top and in the process everyone is involved."
The AMU before Abdul Azis took over a year ago had seen a longish spell of turmoil and chaos, with crime rate shooting up.
Last year, the university was closed sine die after the murder of a student and boarders were told to vacate their hostels. It opened after two months and the break took its toll on studies.
The university has witnessed sporadic protests by students over the last decade.
However, in recent months the university has not only limped back on rails but there has been a spurt in activities including conferences, seminars and a staggered exercise to restructure the university system to give it a modern look
Posted March 11th, 2008 by Mudassir RizwanIndian Muslim By Brij Khandelwal, IANS
Aligarh : The Aligarh Muslim University is trying to make itself compatible with the changing times and needs of the society despite resentment from within.
Vice-chancellor P.K. Abdul Azis is keen that the institution joins the ranks of the best in the field of education.
The vice chancellor told the IANS that a proposal to open five new centres of the university to give it an identifiable all-India character is awaiting clearance from the Ministry of Human Resources Development (HRD), while four examinations centres have started functioning this year.
The University Grants Commission (UGC) has also given Rs.70 million to the university's technical college, the Zakir Hussain College of Engineering and Technology (ZHCET), to upgrade it to the level of the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs).
The money, according to university officials, will give a fillip to the university's initiatives.
M.T. Ahmad, principal, ZHCET, said the HRD ministry has identified the college as one of the seven institutions to be upgraded into an IIT.
The university hopes that its project to upgrade ZHCET will resume as soon as the ministry and the University Grants Commission resume funding under the 11th Plan.
The university has set up four new centres to conduct entrance examinations across the country to give it a pan-India status. The move, though welcomed by almost everybody, was opposed by a section of teachers who alleged that they were not taken into confidence.
The vice-chancellor will meet the teachers March 16 to discuss the initiatives. He denied allegations by some teachers that the university was not following standard democratic procedures to arrive at policy decisions.
"Many teachers feel that the new centres will dilute the hold of the academic community and perhaps lower the prestige of the university," said a leader of the teaching staff.
Early January, the executive council of AMU decided to start four admission test centres at Bhopal, Kolkata, Kozhikode and Pune.
The vice-chancellor appointed four committees comprising deans of faculties, members of the executive council and senior teachers of the university to visit these centres to assess the facilities available, security measures to be adopted and ascertain the reputation of institutions where admission tests were to be conducted.
The university management said at that time that the initiative was aimed at attracting meritorious students to AMU and to strengthen its all-India character.
But most of the teachers do not seem to be in favour of this decentralisation process. "The teachers would be at the mercy of the management and the inconvenient ones would be transferred from one place to the other," a section of the teachers feared.
Mustafa Zaidi, one of the leaders of the teaching community, told IANS: "We are not opposed to changes or initiatives per se, but we would like democratic procedures followed in letter and spirit. The AMU has a well laid out democratic system, the decisions on policy matters have to go from bottom to top and in the process everyone is involved."
The AMU before Abdul Azis took over a year ago had seen a longish spell of turmoil and chaos, with crime rate shooting up.
Last year, the university was closed sine die after the murder of a student and boarders were told to vacate their hostels. It opened after two months and the break took its toll on studies.
The university has witnessed sporadic protests by students over the last decade.
However, in recent months the university has not only limped back on rails but there has been a spurt in activities including conferences, seminars and a staggered exercise to restructure the university system to give it a modern look
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