The ballot papers were all printed and arranged in neat piles in each polling station. The ballot boxes duly locked were also delivered to the appropriate polling stations. There were even election officials present — a remarkable achievement in a country where the bureaucracy is notorious for its lethargy.
The US and its allies in the P5+1 group of countries appear to be dragging their feet in fulfilling their part of the bargain while demanding Iran comply with all its conditions in the nuclear deal. On October 21, the Rahbar, Imam Seyyed Ali Khamenei sent a letter to President Hassan Rouhani pointing this out saying the Islamic Republic’s concessions on the nuclear file were conditional on the other side, especially the US, lifting all sanctions.
Canadians in overwhelming numbers rejected the hateful and Islamophobic policies of Stephen Harper, leader of the Conservative Party, in the October 19 federal election. He was booted out of office in one of the most divisive campaigns that he and his gang of racists and bigots led in Canadian history.
Canada has just lived through a fairytale decade, complete with evil jinn and youthful hero. Think of “Jack and the Beanstalk,” starring youthful naif, Justin Trudeau, and the giant raining evil down on Canadaland from the clouds, Stephen Harper.
Imagine if there were no toilets in the whole of North America, that is, the US and Canada. A total of 354 million people would be without toilets and forced to defecate in the open. It would be a pretty horrific, not to mention stinking experience.
Jeremy Corbyn’s election as leader of the British Labour Party should not be exaggerated or minimized. He is certainly not your average politician hence the long daggers drawn out against him...
Muslims need to overcome the petty differences borne of ignorance to live with each other and learn to tolerate differences...
He may be the prime minister of India but Narendra Modi has committed crimes against humanity for which he must be held accountable. At the very least he cannot be forgiven...
With recurring tragedies virtually every Eid, Muslims should not accept the excuses offered by the Bani Saud. They must be held accountable for their negligence and incompetence...
1Russian President Vladimir Putin has served notice that he will not accept the Western engineered war on Syria to overthrow President Bashar al Asad. He has started bombing Western-backed terrorists creating panic in Western capitals...
“Uneasy lies a head that wears the crown” is a phrase that was coined in Europe when it was engulfed in internecine conflict among warring knights as well as kings facing rebellious barons during the Dark Ages. Some, like Charles I (1649ce) and Louis XVI (1793ce) ended up on the chopping block. The French king’s wife, the Austrian-born duchess, Marie Antoinette faced the guillotine nine months after her husband’s public execution. Today, the monarchy is little more than an expensive piece of decoration to keep the European masses amused and to divert their attention from the drudgery of life.
The AKP-led Turkish government’s fragile peace with the Kurdish rebel group, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) has come to an end and revived horrific memories of the past. Since 2009, Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) had pressed hard to end the ongoing violence in southeastern Turkey. The government’s determined peace negotiations with the PKK initially yielded results and an agree-ment to end the bloody conflict seemed imminent.
Relations between India and Pakistan have never been cordial, in fact often tense, but they have hit new lows in recent weeks. This was again illustrated by the abrupt cancellation of talks between the National Security Advisors of the two countries scheduled for August 23 in Delhi. The latest cancellation occurred against the back-drop of Indian External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj’s virtual ultimatum to Paki-stan to decide by midnight August 22 whether it wanted to meet Indian officials or invite Kashmiri political leaders struggling for freedom from Indian occupation for a meeting in Delhi.
Stepping out of a train station in a European city and seeing a taxi plastered with an advertisement for a swingers club triggered a thought in my mind that leaders, thinkers, scholars, and activists of the global Islamic movement must ponder over deeply and carefully. The thought is not only about haram and halal of gender rela-tions; it is about a realization that committed Muslims today generally lack confi-dence in openly propagating their vision of gender relations.
An Israeli flag next to the rabbi’s podium, a synagogue-wide Israel Independence Day celebration, a prayer for the state of Israel during services — for many, these are innocuous if not positive parts of American Jewish congregational life.
Politics makes for strange bedfellows but the alliance between Turkish President Recep Tayip Erdogan and the Najdi Bedouins occupying the Arabian Peninsula is even stranger than fiction. Here is a quick checklist of facts.
It can no longer be denied that one of the main unintended consequences of the US instigated chaos in the Muslim East (aka the Middle East) is going to be the destabilization of “Saudi” Arabia.
The heat wave sweeping the Indo-Pakistan subcontinent has led to soaring tempera-tures in more areas than one. It has killed a lot of people because of lack of water causing heat stroke.
In our reporting of various regions especially in Central Asia, we have always identified Tajikistan as a special place in the former Soviet Union (FSU) where an Islamic socio-political movement could establish a viable governing system.
The Najdi Bedouins’ attack on Yemen has resulted in not only Saudi casualties but also given rise to freedom movements inside the kingdom. The Bedouins may have bitten more than they can chew.
