Rights watchdog hints Swiss minaret ban could go

By FRANK JORDANS, Associated Press Writer Frank Jordans, Associated Press Writer – Mon Nov 30, 4:45 pm ET

GENEVA – A Swiss ban on minarets could violate fundamental liberties, Europe's top human-rights watchdog said Monday in an indication that the heavily criticized vote could be overturned.

The Council of Europe said banning "new minarets in Switzerland raises concerns as to whether fundamental rights of individuals, protected by international treaties, should be subject to popular votes."

The statement by the 47-nation council's secretary-general, Thorbjorn Jagland, suggests a case may be made to seek a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights condemning Switzerland for violating freedom of expression, freedom of religion and prohibition of discrimination.

Swiss Justice Minister Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf said the ban would come into force immediately, but also indicated that the court could strike down the Sunday vote, which incurred swift condemnation at home and abroad for banning the towers used to put out the Islamic call to prayer.

"The ban contradicts the European Convention on Human Rights," Zurich daily Blick cited Widmer-Schlumpf as saying, referring to the 1950 treaty laying out basic rights that the court in Strasbourg, France, was created to ensure member states abide by.

The referendum backed by nationalist parties was approved by 57.5 percent of the population Sunday, forcing the government to declare illegal the building of any new minarets in Switzerland. It doesn't affect the country's four existing minarets.

France's Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said he was "a bit scandalized" by the vote, which amounts to "oppressing a religion."

"I hope that the Swiss will go back on this decision rather quickly," Kouchner said on France's RTL radio. "It is an expression of intolerance, and I detest intolerance."

The U.N.'s special investigator on religious freedom, Asma Jahangir, said the ban on new minarets constitutes "a clear discrimination against members of the Muslim community in Switzerland."

Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, the secretary general of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, called the ban an "example of growing anti-Islamic incitement in Europe by the extremist, anti-immigrant, xenophobic, racist, scare-mongering ultra-right politicians who reign over common sense, wisdom and universal values."

Wealthy Arab tourists might think twice now about spending their money in Geneva and other Swiss cities popular with visitors from the Gulf, and the neutral country's efforts to mediate in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict could also suffer, said Daniel Warner, a Swiss-American political scientist at the Graduate Institute in Geneva.

Arriving at a meeting of European Union justice ministers, Widmer-Schlumpf argued the vote was not "a referendum against Islam ... but a vote directed against fundamentalist developments."

She defended the referendum as being "about minarets and not, of course, about the Islamic community," she said. "We are interested in a multi-religious society in Switzerland."

Supporters of the ban said the number of Muslims in Switzerland had grown sharply from 50,000 in 1980, but it is still only 4 percent of the 7.5 million population, many of whom don't practice. Western Europe has an estimated 14 million Muslims.

Voting figures showed a rural-urban split in the Swiss vote, with only 38.6 percent of people in major cities backing the ban compared with about two-thirds of the population in smaller towns and villages, officials said.

Anne-Marie Birnstiel, in the wealthy Alpine town of Gstaad told AP Television News she was disappointed by the vote and afraid of the consequences for Switzerland.

But, fellow town resident Anton Seil told APTN that "we are in Switzerland, and if I go to another country I also can't build up my church or represent my faith. So, they have to adapt to us in Switzerland too."

Switzerland isn't alone in expressing fears about a growing Muslim population, though it is the only country where voters can easily enact constitutional amendments through referendums.

France, too, has enacted laws that Muslims claim are directed at them, including a ban on the wearing of religious symbols, such as headscarves, in schools.

A leader of Italy's Northern League party, a key ally in Premier Silvio Berlusconi's conservative coalition, said: "Unfortunately we are faced with a strong attack on (our Christian) identity by an intolerant religion like Islam is." He said he advocated putting a symbol of a cross on the Italian flag.

The Roman Catholic Church, however, condemned the vote.

Monsignor Antonio Maria Veglio, a Vatican official with the Pontifical Council on Migrants, told the Italian news agency ANSA that he shared the position taken by Swiss bishops who called the vote a "hard blow to religious freedom and immigration."

Overnight, opponents of the minaret ban lit candles in front of the Swiss parliament in Bern and hung up banners saying "This is not my Switzerland."

In Zurich, unknown people smashed a glass door of the offices of the nationalist Swiss People's Party — which had backed the ban — cantonal (state) police said.

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Associated Press writers Robert Wielaard in Brussels, Rod McGuirk in Jakarta, Ingrid Rousseau in Paris, Maamoun Youssef in Cairo, Zeina Karam in Beirut, Frances D'Emilio in Rome and APTN producer Dorothee Thiesing in Gstaad contributed to this report.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cG4p90KYfTQ

Rare rainstorms snarl Islam’s annual hajj, soaking millions of pilgrims

Rare, heavy rains soak pilgrims at Islam’s hajj

JIDDAH, Saudi Arabia — Rare, heavy rainstorms soaked pilgrims and flooded the road into Mecca, snarling Islam’s annual hajj as millions of Muslims headed for the holy sites. The downpours add an extra hazard on top of intense concerns about the spread of swine flu.

Pilgrims in white robes holding umbrellas, some wearing face masks for fear of the flu, circled the black cube-shaped Kaaba in Mecca, the opening rite for the hajj. But the shrine — Islam’s holiest site — and the nearby, rain-soaked streets did not see the usual massive crowds, because many tried to stay inside nearby hotels or were caught up in the traffic jams heading into the city.

The hajj — a lifetime dream for Muslims to cleanse their sins — is always a logistical nightmare, as a population the size of a small city moves between Mecca and holy sites in the nearby desert over the course of four days.

In the past, the rites have been plagued by deadly stampedes caused by congestion as the massive crowds perform the rituals — and Saudi authorities Wednesday were clearly concerned the rains could worsen the potential dangers. Civil authorities urged pilgrims to move cautiously and not to rush.

This year has brought the added worry that the massing of more than 3 million people from around the world could bring a swine flu outbreak. For months ahead of the pilgrimage, the Saudi government has been working with the United States’ Center for Disease Control and Prevention to set up clinics and precautionary measures to stem any outbreak.

So far, four pilgrims have died from the H1N1 virus since arriving in Saudi Arabia in recent days, and 67 pilgrims have been diagnosed with the virus, Saudi Health Minister Abdullah al-Rabeeah told the Arab news network Al-Jazeera English.

Shahul Ebrahim, a consultant from the Atlanta, Georgia-based CDC at the hajj, said it was too early to tell if the rains could exacerbate the spread of H1N1, the flu virus.

“Rain can lead to other waterborne diseases … such as the common cold, flu. But we still don’t know how it will effect H1N1. We can’t predict,” he told The Associated Press.

So far, the rain was mainly just causing traffic snarls. Winter is the rainy season in Mecca, and light showers are not uncommon, but such a heavy downpour has not been seen for years during hajj. The pilgrimage takes place according to Islam’s lunar calendar, and so rotates through the year.

Civil Defense spokesman Maj. Abdullah al-Harthi said his organization has plans ready to deal with flooding, including 300 buses to evacuate pilgrims if necessary. He said no casualties have been reported from the rains, the official Saudi Press Agency reported.

One lane of the main road into Mecca was closed by flooding, reducing it to one lane, said Amer al-Amer, an Interior Ministry spokesman. “It cannot handle the pressure of all the people coming from outside Mecca,” he said, adding that it would cause delays of several hours for people trying to reach the sites.

The numbers of pilgrims are expected to exceed last year, when some 3 million attended, al-Amer told AP.

Streets were flooded in the Red Sea coastal city of Jiddah, the entry point for many pilgrims. Pilgrims on Wednesday were making their way to Mecca to perform the circling of the Kaaba and to the nearby desert valley of Mina, where a sprawling tent city has been set up for them to live in.

Water covered the floors in many of the tents, said Suleiman Hamad, a 29-year-old pilgrim in Mina. He said the scene was “muddy, but manageable,” with many pilgrims throwing blankets over their heads when they walked outside.

Rain fell sporadically throughout the day, and stopped by late afternoon in many sites — though it continued to fall in Mecca. Al-Amer and other authorities were optimistic that flooded areas would dry by evening.

On Thursday, the mass of pilgrims will flock to Mount Arafat, a plateau outside Mecca where the prophet Muhammad delivered his farewell sermon. They then proceed to Mina, where over the next three days they perform a rite stoning three stone walls in a symbolic rejection of the devil.

http://blog.taragana.com/n/rare-rainstorms-snarl-islams-annual-hajj-soaking-millions-of-pilgrims-235698/