US attorney general Sally Yates fired in Muslim ban row
Sally Yates quickly dismissed after ordering government lawyers to stop defending US president's immigration ban.
US President Donald Trump has sacked the country's acting attorney general after she took the rare step of defying the White House by refusing to enforce his sweeping immigration ban.
Sally Yates had early on Monday ordered Justice Department lawyers to stop defending Trump's executive order, resulting in her dismissal just hours later.
"The acting Attorney General, Sally Yates, has betrayed the Department of Justice by refusing to enforce a legal order designed to protect the citizens of the United States," the White House press secretary's office said in an unusually caustic statement.
Cleric accused of masterminding 2008 Mumbai attacks under house arrest
Pakistan makes move against Hafiz Saeed after years of pressure from US and India over atrocities that killed 166 people
Reuters in Islamabad
Pakistan has ordered house arrest for the Islamist cleric Hafiz Saeed, who is accused by the US and India of masterminding the 2008 attacks on the Indian financial capital Mumbai that killed 166 people.
The move came after years of pressure and could help ease recently escalating tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbours. Saeed’s continued freedom has long infuriated India.
The US offered $10m (£8m) for information leading to the arrest and conviction of Saeed, who heads the Muslim charity Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD). Washington says JuD is a front for the Pakistan-based militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT).
Donald Trump’s ‘Muslim ban’ will only make terrorist attacks, more, not less likely
Salafi-jihadi leaders are not stupid. They will see that if Trump, unprovoked by any terrorist outrage, will act with such self-defeating vigour, then a few bombs or shootings directed at American targets will lead to more scatter-gun persecution of Muslims – which is exactly what they want
Donald Trump’s travel ban on refugees and visitors from seven Muslim countries entering the US makes a terrorist attack on Americans at home or abroad more rather than less likely. It does so because one of the main purposes of al-Qaeda and Isis in carrying out atrocities is to provoke an overreaction directed against Muslim communities and states. Such communal punishments vastly increase sympathy for Salafi-jihadi movements among the 1.6 billion Muslims who make up a quarter of the world’s population.
The Trump administration justifies its action by claiming that it is only following lessons learned from 9/11 and the destruction of the Twin Towers. But it has learned exactly the wrong lesson: the great success of Mohammed Atta and his eighteen hijackers was not on the day that they and 3,000 others died, but when President George W Bush responded by leading the US into wars in Afghanistan and Iraq that are still going on.
Outcry in Libya after police seize books they consider un-Islamic
OBSERVERS
A police brigade in Al-Marj, a city in eastern Libya, released a video on January 20 in which they bragged about seizing a large number of books, which they claimed went against Sunni values. Their haul included books about Shia Islam but also works by German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche and novels by popular Brazilian author Paulo Coelho. Many Libyans have been outraged about what they say amounts to censorship.
Authorities made the seizure after stopping a truck that was transporting these books to Benghazi. The video posted on the Facebook page of the Al-Marj police shows dozens of confiscated books spread out on a table.
In the video, a senior police officer explains that these books sing the praises of Shia Islam, Freemasonry and black magic. Then, the camera turns to a local religious figure, who says, “These are books that call readers to Christianity. There are also Shiite books as well as pornographic propaganda disguised as novels about Daech [The Islamic State Fundamentalist Organisation], foreign revolutionary books, versions of the Koran that we don’t recognise, books on Judaism, Sufi poetry, books by the Muslim brotherhood, books that call readers to atheism…” He concluded by saying that these books constituted a “very destructive cultural invasion”.
JANUARY 31 2017 - 5:22PM
Indonesia's highest Islamic clerical body to issue fatwa on hoax news
Indonesia's highest Islamic clerical body is poised to issue a fatwa against hoax news amid fears that fake reports on social media are fuelling ethnic and political conflict.
Fake news is a huge problem in Indonesia in the lead-up to the gubernatorial election in February, with much of it targeting the Chinese ethnicity of the current Jakarta governor, Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, better known as Ahok.
The fatwa is further evidence that Indonesian authorities are beginning to repudiate the influence of Islamic hardliners. The man who spearheaded three massive anti-Ahok rallies last year - Rizieq Shihab - was named as a suspect on Monday night for allegedly insulting the state's ideology, Pancasila.Why continued US support is crucial for Colombia's peace process
Substantive progress is already being made in implementing the accords, but if the United States dials back its assistance, that trend could diminish, even reverse. It is in the interests of both countries not to let that happen.
The Trump administration’s likely secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, has declared an intention “to review the details of Colombia’s recent peace agreement, and determine the extent to which the United States should continue to support it.” There are many reasons to hope that once he reviews those details, Mr. Tillerson will conclude that the 2016 agreement, which ends 52 years of fighting between Colombia’s government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) guerrilla group, deserves strong support.
1) Plummeting levels of violence. The 2016 government-FARC accord, and accompanying United Nations-monitored ceasefire, have brought Colombia’s violence to the lowest levels in decades.
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