Father stares at the hand and foot of his five-year-old, severed as a punishment for failing to make the daily rubber quota, Belgian Congo, 1904

He hadn’t made his rubber quota for the day so the Belgian-appointed overseers had cut off his daughter’s hand and foot. Her name was Boali. She was five years old. Then they killed her. But they weren’t finished. Then they killed his wife too. And because that didn’t seem quite cruel enough, quite strong enough to make their case, they cannibalized both Boali and her mother. And they presented Nsala with the tokens, the leftovers from the once living body of his darling child whom he so loved. His life was destroyed. They had partially destroyed it anyway by forcing his servitude but this act finished it for him. All of this filth had occurred because one man, one man who lived thousands of miles across the sea, one man who couldn’t get rich enough, had decreed that this land was his and that these people should serve his own greed. Leopold had not given any thought to the idea that these African children, these men and women, were our fully human brothers, created equally by the same Hand that had created his own lineage of European Royalty.

Full article

When You Kill Ten Million Africans You Aren't Called 'Hitler'

Take a look at this picture. Do you know who it is?

Most people haven’t heard of him.

But you should have. When you see his face or hear his name you should get as sick in your stomach as when you read about Mussolini or Hitler or see one of their pictures. You see, he killed over 10 million people in the Congo.

His name is King Leopold II of Belgium.

He “owned” the Congo during his reign as the constitutional monarch of Belgium. After several failed colonial attempts in Asia and Africa, he settled on the Congo. He “bought” it and enslaved its people, turning the entire country into his own personal slave plantation. He disguised his business transactions as “philanthropic” and “scientific” efforts under the banner of the International African Society. He used their enslaved labor to extract Congolese resources and services. His reign was enforced through work camps, body mutilations, executions, torture, and his private army.

Most of us – I don’t yet know an approximate percentage but I fear its extremely high – aren’t taught about him in school. We don’t hear about him in the media. He’s not part of the widely repeated narrative of oppression (which includes things like the Holocaust during World War II). He’s part of a long history of colonialism, imperialism, slavery and genocide in Africa that would clash with the social construction of the white supremacist narrative in our schools. It doesn’t fit neatly into a capitalist curriculum. Making overtly racist remarks is (sometimes) frowned upon in polite society, but it’s quite fine not to talk about genocides in Africa perpetrated by European capitalist monarchs.

Mark Twain wrote a satire about Leopold called “King Leopold’s soliloquy; a defense of his Congo rule“, where he mocked the King’s defense of his reign of terror, largely through Leopold’s own words. It’s 49 pages long. Mark Twain is a popular author for American public schools. But like most political authors, we will often read some of their least political writings or read them without learning why the author wrote them (Orwell’s Animal Farm for example serves to re-inforce American anti-Socialist propaganda, but Orwell was an anti-capitalist revolutionary of a different kind – this is never pointed out). We can read about Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer, but King Leopold’s Soliloquy isn’t on the reading list. This isn’t by accident. Reading lists are created by boards of education in order to prepare students to follow orders and endure boredom well. From the point of view of the Education Department, Africans have no history.

When we learn about Africa, we learn about a caricaturized Egypt, about the HIV epidemic (but never its causes), about the surface level effects of the slave trade, and maybe about South African Apartheid (which of course now is long, long over). We also see lots of pictures of starving children on Christian Ministry commercials, we see safaris on animal shows, and we see pictures of deserts in films and movies. But we don’t learn about the Great African War or Leopold’s Reign of Terror during the Congolese Genocide. Nor do we learn about what the United States has done in Iraq and Afghanistan, potentially killing in upwards of 5-7 million people from bombs, sanctions, disease and starvation. Body counts are important. And we don’t count Afghans, Iraqis, or Congolese.

There’s a Wikipedia page called “Genocides in History”. The Congolese Genocide isn’t included. The Congo is mentioned though. What’s now called the Democratic Republic of the Congo is listed in reference to the Second Congo War (also called Africa’s World War and the Great War of Africa), where both sides of the multinational conflict hunted down Bambenga and ate them. Cannibalism and slavery are horrendous evils which must be entered into history and talked about for sure, but I couldn’t help thinking whose interests were served when the only mention of the Congo on the page was in reference to multi-national incidents where a tiny minority of people were  eating each other (completely devoid of the conditions which created the conflict no less). Stories which support the white supremacist narrative about the subhumanness of people in Africa are allowed to be entered into the records of history. The white guy who turned the Congo into his own personal part-plantation, part-concentration camp, part-Christian ministry and killed 10 to 15 million Conglese people in the process doesn’t make the cut.

You see, when you kill ten million Africans, you aren’t called ‘Hitler’. That is, your name doesn’t come to symbolize the living incarnation of evil. Your name and your picture don’t produce fear, hatred, and sorrow. Your victims aren’t talked about and your name isn’t remembered.

Leopold was just one part of thousands of things that helped construct white supremacy as both an ideological narrative and material reality. Of course I don’t want to pretend that in the Congo he was the source of all evil. He had generals, and foot soldiers, and managers who did his bidding and enforced his laws. It was a system. But that doesn’t negate the need to talk about the individuals who are symbolic of the system. But we don’t even get that. And since it isn’t talked about, what capitalism did to Africa, all the privileges that rich white people gained from the Congolese genocide are hidden. The victims of imperialism are made, like they usually are, invisible.

Source

Muslim youth summit told female genital mutilation is not part of Islam

 

Jaha Dukureh, the face of a Guardian campaign to raise awareness of FGM in the US, who has taken her campaign back to her home country, said equipping young people at the event with religious arguments was vital in the battle to end FGM within a generation.

“Almost everyone who practises FGM believes it is a religious obligation, and this religious scholar has told us that this is not the case,” she said.

Jaiteh used the example of altered public health practices caused by the Ebola outbreaks to show that traditions could change, and quickly.

“Shaking hands is an obligation in Gambia,” he said. “But now Ebola has led to that practice being curtailed. Shaking hands is obviously therefore simply a cultural practice – when it is discovered that culture can lead to harm, it is stopped. Islam is here to safeguard and repel whatever causes harm.”

The impassioned youthful audience engaged in the detail of Islamic argument, and some young women urged others not to be afraid to challenge practices and laws made without their consent.

“Women were not there when these laws were being made for them,” said Ruqayah Sesay, attending the summit. “So much injustice is being done to women in the name of Islam and we are afraid to challenge it. But we must not be afraid to challenge, we need to stand up and be part of making these laws ourselves.”

Amie Bojang-Sissoko, a veteran anti-FGM campaigner, who has worked with the Gambian feminist organisation Gamcotrap for more than 20 years, said she hoped young people would go directly to the Qur’an to arm themselves with the facts.

She said: “If the prophet was said to love and care for his children, why can’t we learn from him? If he is this type of person why would he condone cutting a female body in the name of Islam? I don’t think he would.”

Bojang-Sissoko said that the youth summit had given new energy to the campaign to end FGM in Gambia, adding that she hoped young people would continue to push for a law that would make FGM illegal. “I am so proud to be working with these young people. At one point I felt we were losing our activism, but now I feel it has been re-energised,” she said.

Source

Female genital mutilation: I watched my sister die in childbirth – video

Real men control themselves not the women they should love and protect.

Fatima Al-Fihri – Founder of the Oldest University in the World

 Excellent Blog post from 'the urban Muslim Women' :

It was a clear sunny day when a noble family journeyed from Kairouan, Tunisia to Fes in Morocco. It was in the early ninth century and many families chose to migrate to the bustling city in the west. For Mohammed Al-Fihri, a wealthy merchant from Tunisia, Fes was excellent avenue for him to continue the family business.

Both his daughters, Fatima and Mariam were well educated. After inheriting a large amount of money from their father, the girls vowed to spend their entire inheritance for the benefit of their community. Whilst Mariam headed the contstruction of the grand mosque Al-Andalus, Fatima planned on the building of another mosque called Al Karaouine which was said to be the largest in North Africa. It was in the midst of the construction of the mosque that the University of Al-Karaouine ( which is still part of the mosque today) was set up.

The University of Al-Karaouine was highly regarded back then as one of the leading spiritual and educational centers of the Muslim world. Today, the Guinness Book of World Records has recognised it to be the oldest continuously operating institution of higher learning in the world.

Fatima Al-Fihri was certainly a lady of foresightedness for the location of the university within the compounds of the mosque attracted scholars from far and wide. Fes, being the most influential cities in the Muslim world has been renowned for centuries as the centre for religion and culture. The university produced great thinkers such as Abu Al-Abbas al-Zwawi, Abu Madhab Al-Fasi, a leading theorist of the Maliki school of Islamic jurisprudence and Leo Africanus, a renowed traveler and writer.
That was not all, the unviersity played a leading role in cultural and academic relations between the Islamic world and Europe. A renowned Jewish philosopher and theologian Maimonides (Ibn Maimun) studied under Abdul Arab Ibn Muwashah. Apart from that, Ibn al-Arabi Ibn Khaldun and Al-Bitruji (Alpetragius) were all connected with the university either as academicians or as students.

As time went by, the university gained the patronage of politically powerful sultans. It compiled a large selection of manuscripts that are currently kept guarded in the library. Among those manuscripts are volumes from the famous Al-Muwatta of Malik written on gazelle parchment, the Sirat Ibn Ishaq, a copy of the Qur’an given to the university by Sultan Ahmad al-Mansur in 1602, and the original copy of Ibn Khaldun’s book Al-’Ibar.

Alongside the Qur’an and Fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence), other subjects that were also taught were grammar, medicine, mathematics, astronomy, chemistry, history, geography and music. Gradually, a broader range of subjects were introduced in the university particularly natural sciences, physics and foreign languages.

Today, Fatima Al-Fihri is highly respected and looked upon by Moroccan women for her wisdom, perserverances and kind heartedness. It was her personal sacrifice that has made her to be an inspiration to all women. Even today, young Moroccan ladies speak greatly of their foremother who not only brought fame to Fes but has carved a name for being the only Muslimah who has built the oldest university which is still running today.

The Qur’an and the Hadith (teachings of the Prophet) inspires every man and woman to seek knowledge. This unique story of Fatima Al- Fihri has shed some light on the role and contribution of Muslim women to Islamic civilisation- It is this role which will hopefully denounce the narrow-mindedness of the western mind of Muslim women. Fatima has shown to us that even in the early centuries that women who are shrouded with the veil are just as willfull and intelligent as those of us today.

Source

The horror of female genital mutilation

"After the pain, it was the screaming that I'll never forget. It wasn't just mine and my sister's screams, there were so many other girls there - all being cut. I've never heard screams like that again and I don't think I ever will."
Aissa, from Mali, West Africa was just six years old when she and her one year-old sister were told: "We have to go somewhere". The sisters were taken on a journey by the female members of their family, oblivious to the torturous destination that was waiting for them. Aissa and her sister were then forced to endure a depraved ritual, scarring them for perpetuity: female genital mutilation.

I ask Aissa, now 29 and living and working as a midwife in London, what she can remember of that day when she and her little sister arrived at the place they were taken to by their step mother. "Isn't it ironic?" says Aissa, "That I can remember everything so clearly, like it happened yesterday, but that is only because the memories of the blood, the pain, the screaming will always haunt me, like a re-occurring bad dream".

Aissa describes how her sister was taken away by a woman to "wait for her turn" while Aissa's stepmother instructed her to lay down on a bed. Aissa did as she was told, as four women stood over her pinning her to the bed as another woman began to cut her. No anaesthetic was used to remove Aissa's clitoris with a razor blade. Aissa explains that it doesn't matter how tightly you are held down, your body instinctively convulses, which results in deeper and longer incisions.

"The pain is, well, it's so difficult to describe to you what it is like. Imagine when you cut your finger, it's a million times worse than that. But that doesn't even begin to describe the type of pain that takes over when the part of your body that has the most nerve endings in it is cut away. Only girls who have been cut will ever know what that level of pain is like. I honestly thought I was going to die, and then everything went black."

Aissa then tells me there is another reason why she will never ever forget that day. Almost whispering, she says: "It was the first time I had ever slept in a real bed; we had always slept on the floor before. I can't remember how long I stayed in the bed, maybe one or two weeks until I was able to walk again."

As you read this, vulnerable young girls (children in the majority of cases) across the world are being led to a place by their mothers, stepmothers, aunts and grandmothers where they will be subjected to physical and emotional pain like no other. That physical and emotional pain inflicted on them, on so many levels, will be and will stay at such an intensity, there are just no appropriate words to attempt to describe the young girls' ordeals. To listen to another woman reflect back to the time she was betrayed by those whom she loved and trusted the most, through the most invasive, barbaric and brutal treachery, is only comparable to torture so extreme it just can't be real, except it is.

Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), also referred to as Female Genital Cutting (FGC), is recognised internationally as a violation of the human rights of girls and women. The World Health Organisation says FGM also violates a person's rights to health, security and physical integrity, the right to be free from torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, and the right to life when the procedure results in death. The United Nations, Amnesty International and UNICEF are just three of many organisations across the world working tirelessly to 'consign FGM to history'.

The World Health Organisation has classified FGM into four types:

1.Clitoridectomy: partial or total removal of the clitoris, and in very rare cases, only the prepuce (the fold of skin surrounding the clitoris).

2.Excision: partial or total removal of the clitoris and the labia (lips) minora, with or without excision of the labia majora. 

3.Infibulation: narrowing of the vaginal opening through the creation of a covering seal. The seal is formed by cutting and repositioning the inner, or outer, labia, with or without removal of the clitoris. (The seal is then cut open and stitched up again to allow for sexual intercourse and childbirth; hence the woman goes through repeated opening and closing procedures, increasing immediate and long-term risks.)

4.Other: all other harmful procedures to the female genitalia for non-medical purposes

Latest figures show around 140 million girls and women worldwide are currently living with the consequences of FGM. The latest statistical exploration from UNICEF states it is most common in western, eastern, and north-eastern regions of Africa. It is also prevalent in many countries in South-East Asia, Europe, North America and Australia. Despite it being illegal in Canada, Australia, Belgium, Denmark, Italy, New Zealand, Norway, Spain, France, Sweden, Switzerland, the US, Kenya, Egypt and the UK, Female Genital Mutilation is still widely practiced.

An utterly useless UK government

The Female Genital Mutilation Act 2003, introduced to close the loophole of the Prohibition of FemaleCircumcision Act 1985 (which permitted parents to take their daughters out of the UK to undergo FGM abroad before bringing them back) does not scare or stop those intent on mutilating our future generations. This act tragically fails to uphold the UK's zero tolerance to FGM. There has not been one single prosecution of FGM in the UK, despite thisabhorrent crime being outlawed in 1985.

Like any illegal practice, thriving ferociously deep and dark underground, it is impossible to be precise regarding the number of girls in the UK who have suffered and are currently suffering at the hands of this brutal and barbaric ritual. The UK charity FORWARD estimates from their research that 66,000 girls in the UK have been mutilated, while 24,000 girls under 16 are at risk from the most severe form of FGM in England and Wales. One would assume then, faced with this alarming calculation, that the British government would swiftly take action and act as a matter of uttermost urgency. That sadly though is just an idealistic aspiration of what should be happening. Our government, whose duty it is to protect its citizens, have adopted what can only be described politely as a pitiful and pathetic 'attempt' to safeguard and protect the thousands of children at risk in the UK. Utterly useless bureaucrats are depriving vital funding, resources, information, care and support to those desperately gasping for it.

If you search FGM on the Home Office website, the search results give little comfort or re-assurance to  its victims, merely  facts, figures and three telephone numbers. The Home Office re-directs most of the responsibility for the charity FORWARD to deal with. On the Department of Health's website there are just seven search results for this ignored and neglected crime - none of which have been updated for over a year. The Home Office and the DofH refused to put anyone forward for interview to answer my questions on what exactly the British government's approach is in dealing with the illegally practiced and prevalent FGM in the UK. They also refused to provide details on what measures have been and are being put in place to safeguard and protect the victims, how the illegal underground networks plan to be broken and how much funding has and is being allocated to fight FGM in the UK.

Quite why no minister is able to speak out to re-assure British citizens that the government are doing everything in their power to tackle the illegal practice of FGM in the UK is just mystifying. A standard statement  was sent from both departments to attempt to provide a response. From the Home Office, Minister for Equalities and Overseas Champion for Tackling Violence Against Women and Girls, Lynne Featherstone says: "Female Genital Mutilation is an abhorrent crime and we are very clear that those found to practice it should feel the full force of the law. As a government, we are also working with UK and international agencies on the ground to help prevent women and girls being subjected to this practice." 

From the Department of Health, a spokesperson says: "We have written to the Royal Colleges of Midwives and Obstetricians and Gynaecologists about making sure we are doing everything possible together to eliminate this abusive and abhorrent practice and protect future generations of girls and women from harm. The current professional guidance highlights that NHS professionals have a clear duty of child protection if a doctor is approached to perform a mutilating procedure or if it becomes known to them that a child is to be taken abroad for that purpose." Neither the Home Office nor the DofH provided details about the type of work they say is happening to protect future generations of girls and women in the UK from harm.

Saria Khalifa, the Youth Programme Officer for FORWARD, tells me the charity is extremely concerned about the British Government's patchy approach to tackling FGM, which is failing to safeguard all children at risk of FGM who reside in the UK. She says: "The UK government has a duty to develop effective primary prevention measures particularly in London where FGM has become a growing concern. Additionally there is need for protection strategies that offer safety nets and specialist support to women and girls. There is no national action plan on FGM nor a strategy in place to engage key communities and key opinion makers on ending FGM. More importantly, the Government funding cuts which have hit the women's sector very deepy, coupled with lack of a comprehensive strategy is making our work even more difficult and a greater struggle."

The poisonous power of patriarchy 

Female Genital Mutilation is without a doubt powered by the poison of patriarchy. In a FGM affected community, there is a fundamental belief that mutilation is the only way to initiate a girl into becoming a "good woman" ready for marriage and childbirth. The bitter irony is that the very process of FGM is achieving the exact opposite. Removing part of a girl or a woman's anatomy, disturbing and forcefully changing the way her body is intended to function not only takes away her femininity, but biologically changes the composition that makes her into the woman that she naturally is intended to be. Women across the world are torturing other women to accommodate and appease an ideology and disorted history of male supremacy. FGM is practiced to satisfy the wishes of a patriarchal family structure, but in reality the men distance themselves from the procedure of the practice, maintaining a dominating presence in the "background" and are not concerned enough with the consequences to stop inflicting this depravity onto their daughters.

Despite the "cultural justification" that FGM "turns a girl into a woman" there is also the assumption that when she does become a "good woman" she needs to be appropriately controlled and oppressed. It is widely believed that removing parts of her genitalia reduces her libido and in turn makes her less sexually demanding, supressing the level of pleasure she is "allowed" to receive and sustain. It is not uncommon in some cases for a woman's vulva to be stitched up, leaving just a small opening for urine and menstrual blood to pass through, before the woman is then re-opened for sexual intercourse and childbirth. 

Aissa says it is not only the damaging physical effects that victims are forced to endure for the rest of their lives:"I still need to work on myself psychologically because of all the feelings of self-loathing I have towards my body. I am different and I look different - for a very long time I didn't even feel like a woman. It was impossible to have sex, the pain was horrific and I have suffered with lots of urinary infections. Still now I find it so difficult to have any medical appointments, which is part of the reason why I wanted to become a midwife to help others who are like me."

There are no cultural or religious justifications ever for mutilating another woman's body. There is no endorsement of FGM in the Bible, the Tanakh or Quran. Charity Forward has published a research on FGM and Islam as many Muslim (as well as non-Muslim) communities tend to associate FGM with Islam. "Words like 'sunna' and 'tahur' used for FGM by Muslims erroneously endorse the link of Islam to FGM and brings the great religion into disrepute. All religions say God created human beings in the best forms and wanted them to keep the nature in which they were created. It is forbidden to make changes in God's creation unless there is a compelling reason ie for medical reasons."

Aissa recently returned to Mali to take the brave step of explaining to her father how the life she dreamt of living was cruelly snatched from her through the destructive and devastating consequences of the Female Genital Mutilation she endured. She tells me she wanted to make the visit to protect future generations of her family - to make sure they never ever have to suffer like she has. After many difficult and emotional discussions with her father, he has now promised Aissa that no other girls in her family will ever be mutilated again.

"And do you believe your father's promise?" I ask. 

 Aissa pauses, then responds slowly: "Yes I do, what other choice do I have, but to have faith in those whom I love and trust the most"?

source

Islamic Relief UK: East Africa Crisis Appeal - Children in Need

Please watch the video below- It's only around 2 minutes long. Alhumdulillah, we can never thank Allah enough for everything HE has given us. Please give how much you can inshAllah.




Ibn ‘Abbas (ra) narrated “Allah’s Messenger (peace be upon him) was the most generous of people and he was the most generous in the month of Ramadan, when Jibreel would meet him. Jibreel used to meet him every night of Ramadan to teach him the Quran.” This hadith emphasises the need to be generous in giving all kinds of charity in Ramadan, in addition to studying the Quran. It is also important to feed others, especially those with less. The Prophet (peace be upon him) said “whoever gives a fasting person (food or drink to break their fast), they will have similar to the reward of the one who fasted, without any decrease for the one who fasted.”

JazakAllah Khairun.

Please donate to support the people of East Africe dying of famine

Cameroon's conjoined twins help spread Islam

By Francis Ngwa Niba
Babanki Tungo, Cameroon

Cameroonian conjoined twins Pheinbom and Shevoboh were seen as a bad omen when born, but their successful separation by Saudi surgeons has changed their lives - and the faith of some in their village.

They were joined at the chest, abdomen and pelvis when born and some of the delivery nurses in Babanki Tungo, a village in north-west Cameroon, were so shocked by the "strange birth" that they ran out of the small clinic.

The basic medical services in Babanki Tungo were ill-equipped to care for the girls and, following an internet appeal, the Saudi king agreed to pay for them to be flown to Saudi Arabia for surgery in 2007.

The 16-hour operation succeeded in separating the twins and now they each have their own stomach.

However, nearly three years on from the surgery, serious physical challenges remain.

After the separation, the girls were left with one leg each, and they are now waiting to return to Saudi Arabia to be fitted with artificial limbs and begin the arduous task of learning how to walk.

At the moment, they can only crawl. Even so, the twins are playful, talkative and mischievous - typical four-year-old girls, in fact.

But when they were born, they were anything but typical.

Islamic conversions

Some people in Babanki Tungo - a farming village known for producing many of Cameroon's vegetables - thought they were "satanic gifts" sent to punish their father, who already had 13 other children by two different wives.

Others believed that Pheinbom and Shevoboh were sent to punish the whole village, after a traditional leader in the region was burnt alive by his angry subjects.

"It was very difficult when the babies were still joined together," the girls' mother Emerencia Nyumale remembers.

"People used to see me carrying them and run away and I felt so guilty and alone," she says.

"Thank God all that has ended now since their separation."

The girls' story has had another importance consequence for the people of Babanki Tungo.

The Saudi government is funding an Islamic centre in the village consisting of a mosque, nursery, primary school and health centre.

This has led some village elders to predict that the largely Christian Babanki Tungo will be slowly Islamised.

The twins' parents have taken the lead.

As a mark of appreciation to their daughters' Saudi benefactors, they have converted to Islam.

The girl's father, Ngong James Akumbu, now calls himself "Abdallah", Emerencia goes by "Aisha", and five or their children attend the Islamic primary school.

Blessing or curse?

Kum Edwin, a teacher at the school, has also converted.

"Before the school was opened, I was unemployed, had many girlfriends and drank a lot," says Mr Edwin, who has changed his name to "Abdallah Wagf".

"When I heard an Islamic school will be opened here, I did a three-month Islamic studies [course]… I no longer drink a lot and I am now searching for a wife because having lots of girlfriends is not good."

Many people in Babanki Tungo now see the birth of Pheinbom and Shevoboh as a blessing rather than a curse.

The sight of the twins crawling around the village no longer attracts mistrustful looks, as once it did.

"I always tell every parent to be patient because God always tempts people by showing them bad things which are good things in the future," muses the girls' father.

Indeed, the twins have seen a remarkable change in their fortunes.

From outcasts at birth, they now have their own, separate lives and have played an important part in changing the lives of the people around them.

After all that, learning to walk may prove to be easy.

source

Nine African Boxers & Coach Embrace Islam

Highly-impressed by the Muslim culture and the Pakistani hospitality, six visiting Central African Republic, (CAR), and three Cameroon boxers and their coach converted from Christianity to Islam at a simple ceremony in a Karachi hotel on Tuesday.

According to a news story posted with byline Shazad Ali on web news portal www.dawn.com the six pugilists from CAR – Gbodo Ygor, Selebangue Bienvenu, Vomitiande Huges, Grassa Thibault, Niambongui Davy and Ngocko Martial – had announced on Monday there wish to be converted to Islam.

However, three Cameroon boxers, Ketchemi Joseph Justin, Mendoua Blase, Mulema Joseph and their coach Tchuem Justin also embraced Islam along with the six from CAR on Tuesady. The conversion ceremony was also attended by CAR coach Mohamed Kalambaye who is a born Muslim.

The nine African boxers and coach Justin, who were attired in crisp white kurta shalwar (shirt and baggy trousers), were garlanded and offered sweets by the organisers of the boxing tournament after they converted to Islam.

The nine boxers and the Cameroon coach are in Karachi to participate in the ongoing Benazir international boxing tournament.

Kalambaye said the three Cameroon boxers and their coach joined them when the CAR pugilists were about to convert to Islam, the website said.

When they (Cameroon boxers and coach) saw how I am being greeted by everyone here, they were impressed. And when they came to know that six of our boxers are about to convert to Islam, they also joined them. This is how they also converted to Islam,' Kalambaye told Dawn.com.

Kalambaye said that his boxers have converted to Islam on their free will and without being instigated by him or anybody else and the pugilists were impressed by the teachings of Islam and Pakistan's hospitality.

All our boxers have converted from Christianity to Islam by heart and there was no compulsion on them,' Kalambaye reportedly said. "I am a Muslim since my birth and know there will be no problems for these boxers back home", he said.

While the Central Africans were impressed by the local hospitality, they were also inspired when they saw their coach being greeted and welcomed warmly by the locals.

However, according to Kalambaye the African boxers in fact were even more impressed with Islam since it does not discriminate on the basis of cast, creed or colour of skin.

The event was overseen by chief cleric of the Jamia Binnoria institute Mufti Naeem at a local hotel. Naeem termed the occasion an “historic event.”

“This is a historic event. I have travelled round the world but have never seen so many people embracing Islam at one time. This proves Islam is an exemplary religion and teaches humanity,” said Naeem.“No one can impose religion on anyone by force and I hope these boxers further study the religion and become good humans and Muslims,” he added.

While Islamophobia has been increasing in the West because of terrorism and religious extremism, it was a unique incident in Pakistan where visiting sportspersons from foreign Christian-dominated countries have converted to Islam, the report said.

It may be mentioned here that the ongoing boxing event is the first-ever international sporting event to be staged in Pakistan since the attacks on the visiting Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore some 10 months ago. (pervezbari@eth.net)

Youssou N'Dour's fight against Malaria

Youssou N'Dour has used his status as a singer, percussionist and actor to fight for many causes over the years.

He has performed to free Nelson Mandela, the former South African president, when the elder statesman had been jailed for 27 years under the Apartheid government.

He has also participated in the Live Aid concerts to end poverty and has been a Unicef ambassador.

As an actor he has highlighted black history by playing the role of Oliudah Equina, the African writer whose experiences as a slave prompted him to become involved in the British abolition movement once he had been set free.

Now he has turned his focus to combating Malaria, a disease which annually kills one million people, more than 80 per cent of whom are in Africa. According to Nothing But Nets, a grassroots global organisation partnered with the UN to combat malaria, some 500 million people a year are affected by the disease.

N'Dour has just released a single – "Fight Malaria" – and has launched a campaign with the charity Malaria no More called Surround sound Senegal. He has used his star status to urge every family in Senegal and Africa to sleep under a mosquito net.

Al Jazeera's Kathleen McCaul caught up with him before a concert in London to talk about his new work with Malaria no More, Africa, Islam and his music.

Read the Interview here.

You can watch one of the video's here.

Nick Griffin, not just an Islamophobe but a Racist as well

I generally tend to ignore people like him but Nick Griffin, leader of the far right BNP, has been elected an an MEP or a Member of European Parliament by the British people, so its just fair to highlight his views.

Boats carrying illegal migrants to Europe should be sunk Nick Griffin, the leader of the British National party, said yesterday.

In a provocative intervention, Griffin, elected to the European parliament last month, called on the EU to introduce "very tough" measures to prevent illegal migrants entering Europe from Africa.

"If there's measures to set up some kind of force or to help, say the Italians, set up a force which actually blocks the Mediterranean then we'd support that," Griffin told BBC Parliament's The Record Europe.

"But the only measure, sooner or later, which is going to stop immigration and stop large numbers of sub-Saharan Africans dying on the way to get over here is to get very tough with those coming over. Frankly, they need to sink several of those boats. Anyone coming up with measures like that, we'll support, but anything which is there as a 'oh, we need to do something about it' but in the end doing something about it means bringing them into Europe we will oppose."

Shirin Wheeler, the programme's presenter, interrupted him to say the EU did not murder people. "I didn't say anyone should be murdered at sea – I say boats should be sunk, they can throw them a life raft and they can go back to Libya," Griffin said. "But Europe has, sooner or later, to close its borders or it's simply going to be swamped by the third world."

Griffin's comments were especially controversial because many thousands of migrants from sub-Saharan Africa attempt to make the crossing to Europe on rickety boats during the summer. Many land on Lampedusa, the Italian island less than 100 miles from Tunisia. The BBC said 37,000 migrants landed on Italian shores last year, a 75% increase on the year before.

Italy gave Libya three patrol boats in May to help control the number of migrants crossing the Mediterranean. The BBC reported that Roberto Maroni, the Italian interior minister, a member of the anti-immigration Northern League, had described the first 200 migrants returned to Libya as a "historic" moment.