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4 UK schools ban Ramadan fast for Muslims

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A total of four primary schools in the UK have imposed a ban on Muslim students preventing them from fasting.

A total of four primary schools in the UK have imposed a ban on Muslim students preventing them from fasting.

by World Bulletin

A total of four primary schools in the U.K. have imposed a ban on fasting for Muslim students during the month of Ramadan, according to British media.

Barclay Primary School in east London — one of the four schools that operate under a common foundation called Lion Academy Trust — informed the parents of the students of the decision in a letter sent last week.

Written by the school’s acting head, Aaron Wright, the letter asserted that children were not required to fast during Ramadan under Islamic Law, but were only required to do so “when they become adults”.

“Previously, we have had a number of children who became ill and children who fainted or who have been unable to fully access the school curriculum in their attempt to fast,” the head also said.

In the letter, the duration of fasting — 18 hours last year as it is mentioned in the letter — was described as quite long for a child without sustenance and water.

The Muslim Association of Britain (MAB) condemned the fasting ban.

“We believe that there are sufficient and stringent rules within Islam which allow those who are unable to fast, to break fast,” the Mail Online quoted a spokesman of the association as saying.

The Muslim Association of Britain also stressed that this was a decision that should be left up to the parents of the students.

The other three schools that will implement the ban are Sybourn, Thomas Gamuel and Brook House Primary Schools.

There are about 3 million Muslims in the U.K.

The holy month of Ramadan, the ninth of the Islamic lunar calendar,begins Wednesday.

Amid torture, experts say CIA's other crime was 'human experimentation'

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Formerly classified document exposes how agency’s attempt to legitimize abusive interrogation program was itself another layer of crime

A demonstrator is held down during a simulation of waterboarding outside the US Justice Department in 2007. (Photo: Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)

A demonstrator is held down during a simulation of waterboarding outside the US Justice Department in 2007. (Photo: Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)

by Jon Queally, Common Dreams

After the Central Intelligence Agency was given authority to begin torturing suspected terrorists in the wake of the attacks of September 11, 2001, newly published documents show that another of that program’s transgressions, according to experts, was a gross violation of medical ethics that allowed the agency to conduct what amounted to “human experimentation” on people who became test subjects without consent.

Reported exclusively by the Guardian on Monday, sections of a previously classified CIA document—first obtained by the ACLU—reveal that a long-standing policy against allowing people to become unwitting medical or research subjects remained in place and under the purview of the director of the CIA even as the agency began slamming people into walls, beating them intensely, exposing them to prolonged periods of sleep deprivation, performing repeated sessions of waterboarding, and conducting other heinous forms of psychological and physical abuse.

The document details agency guidelines—first established in 1987 during the presidency of Ronald Reagan but subsequently updated—in which the CIA director and an advisory board are directly empowered to make decisions about programs considered “human subject research” by the agency.

As journalist Spencer Ackerman reports:

The relevant section of the CIA document, “Law and Policy Governing the Conduct of Intelligence Agencies”, instructs that the agency “shall not sponsor, contract for, or conduct research on human subjects” outside of instructions on responsible and humane medical practices set for the entire US government by its Department of Health and Human Services.

A keystone of those instructions, the document notes, is the “subject’s informed consent”.

That language echoes the public, if obscure, language of Executive Order 12333 – the seminal, Reagan-era document spelling out the powers and limitations of the intelligence agencies, including rules governing surveillance by the National Security Agency. But the discretion given to the CIA director to “approve, modify, or disapprove all proposals pertaining to human subject research” has not previously been public.

The entire 41-page CIA document exists to instruct the agency on what Executive Order 12333 permits and prohibits, after legislative action in the 1970s curbed intelligence powers in response to perceived abuses – including the CIA’s old practice of experimenting on human beings through programs like the infamous MK-Ultra project, which, among other things, dosed unwitting participants with LSD as an experiment.

The previously unknown section of the guidelines empower the CIA director and an advisory board on “human subject research” to “evaluate all documentation and certifications pertaining to human research sponsored by, contracted for, or conducted by the CIA”.

Critics have long blasted any members of the medical community who participated in the torture program as traitors to their ethical and professional duties, but as the Guardiannotes, “The CIA, which does not formally concede that it tortured people, insists that the presence of medical personnel ensured its torture techniques were conducted according to medical rigor.”

But Steven Aftergood, a scholar of the intelligence agencies with the Federation of American Scientists, told the Guardian that these men who were tortured by the agency were, in fact, being studied by medical professionals to see how they would respond to such treatment. In addition to the inherent crime of that abuse, they were also unwitting subjects who never gave their informed consent to be studied in this way. “There is a disconnect between the requirement of this regulation [contained in the document] and the conduct of the interrogation program,” Aftergood explained. “They do not represent consistent policy.”

And Nathaniel Raymond, a former war-crimes investigator with Physicians for Human Rights and now a researcher with Harvard University’s Humanitarian Initiative, put it this way: “Crime one was torture. The second crime was research without consent in order to say it wasn’t torture.”

Egypt court upholds Morsi death sentence

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Court confirms death sentence for deposed president Mohamed Morsi on charges related to a 2011 jailbreak case.

Former president Mohamed Morsi appeared inside a cage in the courtroom where he stood trial in Cairo [EPA]

Former president Mohamed Morsi appeared inside a cage in the courtroom where he stood trial in Cairo [EPA]

by Al Jazeera

An Egyptian court upheld a death sentence against deposed president Mohamed Morsi for plotting jailbreaks and attacks on police during the 2011 uprising.

The court had initially sentenced Morsi and more than 100 other defendants to death last month.

Tuesday’s ruling comes after the court consulted Egypt’s grand mufti, the government interpreter of Islamic law who plays an advisory role.

Earlier on Tuesday, the same court sentenced Morsi, the country’s first democratically elected president, to life in prison on charges of spying for the Palestinian Hamas movement, Lebanon’s Shia Hezbollah, and Iran.

Tuesday’s verdicts can be appealed.

Then army chief and now President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi ousted Morsi on July 3, 2013, and since then has overseen a sweeping crackdown against his supporters.

The crackdown has left hundreds of Muslim Brotherhood supporters dead and thousands jailed.

Hundreds have been sentenced to death after speedy mass trials described by the United Nations as “unprecedented in recent history”.

In the jailbreak trial, exiled Egyptian-born cleric Yusuf al-Qaradawi was also condemned to death in absentia from his base in Qatar.

Sexual harassment, rape allegations rock Greenpeace

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Greenpeace

New Delhi: Environment rights NGO Greenpeace India could be in for more trouble as an ex-staffer has gone public with allegations of rape and sexual harassment by her colleagues.

The organisation’s inaction against the perpetrators has spurred more female ex-employees to come out with similar accusations. Now, the NGO is at the receiving end with activists lambasting the organisation’s irresponsible handling of the cases.

Recently, Greenpeace was in the news after the government froze it’s accounts for non-compliance of norms. The Delhi High Court, however, released two of its accounts so that it could function.

In an article published on a web forum last week, an ex-employee (name withheld) of Greenpeace alleged that she had to leave her job in 2013 after being sexually harassed and raped by her colleagues.

Narrating her ordeal, she said that it started a year after she had joined the NGO at their Bengaluru office. The first incident happened during an official trip in October 2012. “I got a call from a senior colleague at 11 pm, asking me to vacate my room and insisting that I sleep in his suite. In another incident, he approached me physically despite my discomfort, insisted on force-feeding me birthday cake,’ she told IANS.

Though she registered a written complaint with the HR manager, she did not receive any verbal or written communication from the Internal Complaints Committee (ICC) of the organisation, which looks into sexual harassment cases. To her shock, she learnt that the person was a serial offender and no action had been taken against him despite his misbehaviour with two other female employees.

However, she said, she was blamed for registering the complaint. “Once in an official meeting, in my absence, two senior employees indulged in character assassination against me. Even some female colleagues, part of the ICC, made me feel that I was at fault, that I didn’t know how to ‘set boundaries’,” she said.

However, matters came to a head in 2013. “It was after a party, when a male colleague whom I knew quite well found me unconscious and raped me. You cannot imagine the pain and fear I went through. I was terrified to speak and I knew even if I had, no one in this organisation would come to my aid. I did not have the strength to report my rape, neither to the police, nor to my employers. How could I, when the processes had failed me once already?” she asked. Traumatised, she left the NGO after a few months.

She said it took her long to overcome the incident, and finally, she decided to tell her story through a Facebook post in February this year. Immediately after her post, Greenpeace issued an apology on their website and promised her to re-investigate the case in an adequate manner. Admitting the lax attitude in dealing with the case in 2012, the statement said, “The victim deserves both an apology and a meticulous examination of what happened.”

However, the victim pointed out that the NGO’s subsequent actions exposed their empty talk. “The ICC, which convened in March, recommended the termination of the offender, but the executive director overrode the decision on some pretext and the only thing I received was a written apology from the molester,’’ she said.

Supporting the claims of the victim, another ex-senior manager Reema Ganguly, who was a part of the ICC, told IANS that she quit Greenpeace in May after executive director Samit Aich overrode the committee’s recommendation. “The committee’s suggestion of terminating the molester was overturned by the executive director, and they dismantled the committee which was only three months old, whereas the duration (for such a committee) is for three years. It was very clear that the committee is an eyewash by the NGO,’’ said Ganguly.

However, Aich defended the decision to dismantle the committee. ”We came to know that the committee decisions were leaked to many people in the office. So I sought legal opinion on this and I was told that since its leaked, the decision stands invalid. So we dissolved the committee and reconstituted it,” said Aich.

When asked why they did not follow the committee’s decision of terminating the offender, Aich said a strong warning was given to the person. “I have given a strong warning to the person and as a result, he has put in his papers. I admit that there have been flaws in our earlier system and we will tighten our disciplinary actions in future,” he added.

Reacting to the allegations, Programme Director for Greenpeace India, Divya Raghunandan, told IANS that the former employees had raised some valid issues and that they will investigate it in a “serious manner”. Acknowledging that there were flaws in the earlier system, Raghunandan said, “When we revisited the cases, we felt that it should have been handled in a better way.”

Asserting that they were re-evaluating the overall procedures for handling complaints of sexual harassment, she said that the employee in question had resigned. “We have reconstituted the ICC and ordered an audit into the old cases. The implicated employee has put in his papers already,’’ she said.

However, activists and former employees question the failure of the NGO in punishing a serial offender and protecting him for years.

Holding the executive director of Greenpeace India responsible for the shabby handling of the cases, Kavita Krishnan, Secretary of the All India Progressive Women’s Association, said that the events had tarnished the image of the NGO. “Greenpeace failed to stand by their promise of punishing the offender. They disbanded a committee, which recommended punishment for the molester. The NGO is muzzling voices of dissent. They have stretched the cases for so many years. The punishment has to be spelt out clearly,’’ Krishnan said adding that they have written to Greenpeace International and were waiting for their response to act further.

Voicing similar concerns, Usha Saxena, a former employee, alleged that she was forced to quit Greenpeace because she took a stand against the rampant cases of harassment in the NGO. Saxena, who joined Greenpeace in 2009, said that her protests against sexist jokes and remarks fell on deaf ears. “I filed a misconduct complaint against senior HR director for making discriminatory and threatening remarks about my gender, my age and ordering me to seek ‘psychological counselling’. For that, I was bullied out in 2013,’’ Saxena told IANS.

Another ex-staffer (name withheld) also said that she was harassed by the same person implicated in the first incident. She said she resigned in March 2015 after inaction by the NGO. “He made some objectionable comments in front of many senior colleagues, including the executive director. No one reacted, rather they were all amused. “Though she registered a complaint with the HR Department the next day, it met the same fate as the previous ones,” she told IANS. She also said she would take further legal action if the offender is not punished.

(IANS)

Dalit girl beaten up as her shadow falls on high caste muscleman

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dalit

Ganeshpura: In a shocking incident, a minor Dalit girl was allegedly beaten up by higher caste women in Ganeshpura village here after the victim’s shadow fell on a muscleman belonging to their family, police said today.

The incident took place on June 13 and the complaint was also filed on the same day at Gadi Malhera police station, Additional Superintendent of Police (ASP), Neeraj Pandey said.

According to the complaint lodged by the girl’s father, the problem began when his daughter was fetching water from a village hand pump and her shadow fell on muscle-man Puran Yadav (belonging to a higher caste) when he happened to pass from there, the ASP said.

The episode enraged the family of the muscle-man to such an extent that the women of the family severely beat the girl and threatened that if she was spotted again at the hand pump, they would kill her, he said.

Yadav’s family also prevented the victim from going to police station, but they somehow managed to reach there.

A case under sections 323, 341, 506 of the IPC has been registered against the accused and further investigation is underway.

In several remote pockets of India, where untouchability is still prevalent, people from the lower caste are forbidden to come in contact with those belonging to the higher rung so much so that they can’t share their food, cook for them or even look them in the eye. It is even forbidden for their shadow to fall on higher caste people, who consider it as defiling or polluting.

(PTI)

PM must order probe to expose real gameplan: Shiv Sena on Sushma Swaraj row

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Saamana-News-Epaper

Mumbai: Claiming that Sushma Swaraj has been targeted under a “political game” to oust her from BJP, Shiv Sena today said it is imperative for Prime Minister Narendra Modi to step in and order an investigation to know who is so keen on “maligning” her “clean” reputation.

Sena, which has come out in support of the External Affairs Minister in the row over helping scam-tainted former IPL Commissioner Lalit Modi obtain British travel papers, said Congress was “lifeless” and its reaction did not mean much but “who is trying to give flight to its wings”.

“The Congress party is behaving as if Swaraj has helped get bail to arrested fugitive gangster Dawood Ibrahim or Kasab. This controversy is being fuelled by using a section of the media. It is vital for Prime Minister Narendra Modi to order an investigation on who is so keen on maligning her clean reputation of 35-40 years,” the Sena said in an edit in its mouthpiece ‘Saamana’.

“Covering Swaraj in a mist of controversy and questions seems to be a huge political game being played to oust her from the BJP and from national politics,” the Sena alleged.

It said that PM Modi too may get engulfed in such controversies in the future and that some of his cabinet ministers are being tactfully harassed.

The edit added that similar allegations had been levelled against Home Minister Rajnath Singh’s son in the recent past and also against Nitin Gadkari, when he took over as the President of the BJP.

“An Indian has been helped on humanitarian grounds. Why so much fuss over it? The Congress has become lifeless now and thus its flutter also does not mean much. But the question is who is trying to give flight to these fluttering wings,” the Sena said.

“If somebody is attacking the External Affairs Ministry to weaken it and thereby trying to demoralise the Modi government, the person is ultimately causing harm to the country. This a very big political game that needs to be ended by PM Modi,” it added.

(PTI)

'Sushma offered to quit but RSS sought she continued'

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Sushma Swaraj

New Delhi: External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj offered to resign almost a week before the controversy broke out over her help to former IPL commissioner Lalit Modi in getting travel documents on “humanitarian ground”, but her offer was rejected on the intervention of the RSS, informed sources said.

The sources said the news channel that on Sunday read out e-mails of a British MP concerning travel documents for Modi, had sent an e-mail to Sushma Swaraj almost a week before, seeking her response on the issue.

Soon after that she met Prime Minister Narendra Modi and informed him of the matter in detail, a highly placed source told IANS.

Sources said a meeting of senior Bharatiya Janata Party leaders and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh functionaries was convened a day later by Modi to discuss the matter and to chalk out the future strategy.

They said at the meeting Sushma Swaraj clarified her stand on the issue and said she was ready to resign as she did not want the government to face any embarrassment. But RSS functionaries stopped her, saying she has done nothing wrong, the sources added.

The RSS functionaries also said that Sushma Swaraj had made it clear in her communication that any help rendered by the British authorities to Lalit Modi should be subject to their rules.

According to sources, the meeting chalked out strategy to defend Sushma Swaraj.

As part of the strategy, Bharatiya Janata Party president Amit Shah, Home Minister Rajnath Singh and RSS leader Indresh Kumar came out in support of Sushma Swaraj on Sunday.

The controversy, which first appeared in a British newspaper, went on to dominate Indian news channels from Sunday.

(IANS)

Vote in Modi's name; CM candidate not finalised: BJP tells Bihar

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Photo: PTI

Photo: PTI

Patna: The BJP said on Tuesday it will not announce its chief ministerial candidate and instead fight the coming Bihar assembly elections in the name of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

“The BJP will not announce its chief ministerial candidate. The BJP has several capable leaders for the top political post in the state but it will fight the assembly elections in the name of Prime Minister Narendra Modi,” said Ananth Kumar, union minister for chemicals and fertilisers and party incharge for Bihar.

“Narendra Modi is the BJP face; our party will contest the assembly polls under his leadership,” he told the media here.

BJP’s main rival – ruling Janata Dal-United, RJD, Congress and Nationalist Congress Party combine – declared Nitish Kumar as its candidate for the top post on June 8.

Nitish Kumar said that the party had, in the last one year, contested assembly elections in different states in the name of Modi.

The union minister downplayed the repeated demand of Rashtriya Janata Dal chief Lalu Prasad and Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar that the BJP too declare its chief ministerial candidate.

BJP ally Rashtriya Lok Samta Party said on Monday that its party chief and union minister Upendra Kushwaha be declared the opposition alliance’s chief ministerial candidate.

However, another BJP ally, union minister Ram Vilas Paswan’s Lok Janshakti Party, announced last week that Paswan would not be the NDA’s chief ministerial candidate.

Former Bihar chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi, who announced joining the NDA alliance in the state, said he was not in the race for the top job and only a BJP leader would be the candidate.

In the caste-ridden politics of Bihar, over half a dozen BJP leaders from the upper castes and the backward castes have staked their respective claims for projection as chief ministerial candidate.

(PTI)

Practice Yoga regularly to stay fit, Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar advises BJP president Amit Shah

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amit-nitish

Patna: Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar has advised BJP president Amit Shah to practice yoga regularly rather than do politics over it.

Mr Kumar told reporters, “Has he seen his body whether it is suitable to do yoga? He should practise yoga silently at home everyday to stay fit. This will bring internal change in him too.”

BJP has been pushing for more participation from schools and educational institutions on International Yoga Day on June 21. Some Muslim groups like the Muslim Personal Law Board had opposed the central government’s move to make it compulsory in schools, saying that yoga asanas like Surya Namaskar are un-Islamic. The government had denied issuing any such directions.

Mr Kumar who practices yoga regularly said, “Yoga is very useful and should be practised sincerely at home for good health. But BJP is indulging in show off in the name of yoga which is triggering dispute.”

Mr Shah will take part in yoga day celebrations in Patna on June 21.

Assembly elections in Bihar are due in a few months at the end of this year. Mr Shah held discussions with union minister Ram Vilas Paswan in Delhi today, to take stock of the political situation.

BJP announced a tie up with former Bihar chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi this Thursday; Mr Manjhi and Mr Kumar were once friends, but now bitter political rivals.

The National Democratic Alliance (NDA), comprising of BJP, Ram Vilas Paswan’s Lok Janshakti Party and Upendra Kushwaha’s Rashtriya Lok Samata Party had swept the 2014 general elections winning 31 out of 40 seats in the state.

Mr Kumar’s Janata Dal (United) and former chief minister Lalu Prasad’s Rashtriya Janata Dal have already announced a tie-up between the two and Congress for the upcoming assembly elections.

(With inputs from Press Trust of India)

In public challenge to Obama, family of drone victim asks: 'What is the value of an innocent life?'

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Seeking official apology, Faisal bin Ali Jaber says, ‘Imagine that your loved one was wrongly killed by the U.S. government. Imagine they would not even admit their role in the death of your family members.’

In April, U.S. President Barack Obama, pictured with director of the CIA John Brennan, publicly apologized for the killing of two western hostages. (Photo: file)

In April, U.S. President Barack Obama, pictured with director of the CIA John Brennan, publicly apologized for the killing of two western hostages. (Photo: file)

by Lauren McCauley, Common Dreams

The family of two U.S. drone victims is refusing to keep their pain silent as they seek an official apology by U.S. President Barack Obama for the deaths of their kin.

In a CNN op-ed published on Friday, Faisal bin Ali Jaber, a Yemeni civil engineer, issued a public challenge to the U.S. leader—who recently made public statements about the deaths of two westerners killed by U.S. drone strikes, but has refused to acknowledge Yemeni civilian casualties.

“What is the value of a human life?” Jaber asks.

In the column, Jaber describes how following the August 2012 strike that killed Waleed and Salem bin Ali Jaber, the family had to identify them “from their clothes and scraps of matted hair.”

And how in the wake of the strike, while the family awaited an official apology, they were instead presented with “$100,000 in sequentially-marked U.S. dollars in a plastic bag.”

Jaber writes: “A Yemeni security service official was given the unpleasant task of handing this over. I looked him in the eye and asked how this was acceptable, and whether he would admit the money came from America. He shrugged and said: ‘Can’t tell you. Take the money.'”

“The secret payment to my family represents a fraction of the cost of the operation that killed them,” he continues. “This seems to be the Obama administration’s cold calculation: Yemeni lives are cheap. They cost the President no political or moral capital.”

In contrast to the experience of Jaber and other relatives of innocent Yemenis killed by the U.S. drone war, in April, Obama publicly acknowledged that a U.S. counterterrorism operation had killed an American, Warren Weinstein, and an Italian, Giovanni Lo Porto. The lawsuit follows another failed court challenge in Germany in which Jaber’s family sought to prosecute the home of Ramstein Air Base for its role in “facilitating American covert drone strikes in Yemen.”

“Like a lot of Americans, my family and I watched the President’s speech at home,” Jaber writes. “But while many praised him for his forthrightness, we do not share that view. His speech shocked us. No, it was worse: his speech broke our hearts.

“As I watched,” he continues, “I thought of my dead relatives, names that so far as I know have never crossed the President’s lips: Waleed and Salem bin Ali Jaber.”

On Monday, Jaber filed a suit asking a Washington D.C. district court to issue a declaration that the strike that killed Salem and Waleed was unlawful. He is seeking no monetary compensation.

“Imagine that your loved one was wrongly killed by the U.S. government, and the White House would not apologize. Imagine they would not even admit their role in the death of your family members,” Jaber concludes. “We simply want the truth and an apology. We will not rest until it is ours.”

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