By MARYAM NAMAZIE - GUARDIAN.CO.UK
Added: Mon, 05 Jul 2010 17:43:04 UTC

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To safeguard our rights there must be one law for all and no religious courts

Gita Sahgal says there is active support for sharia laws because it is limited to denying women rights in the family. Photograph: Richard Saker

The recent global day against the imminent stoning of Sakine Mohammadi-Ashtiani in Iran for adultery is an example of the outrage sparked by the brutality associated with sharia law's penal code.

What of its civil code though – which the Muslim Council of Britain's Shaykh Ibrahim Mogra describes as "small aspects" that concern "marriage, divorce, inheritance, custody of children"? According to human rights campaigner Gita Sahgal, "there is active support for sharia laws precisely because it is limited to denying women rights in the family. No hands are being cut off, so there can't be a problem …"

Now a report, Sharia Law in Britain: A Threat to One Law for All and Equal Rights, reveals the adverse effect of sharia courts on family law. Under sharia's civil code, a woman's testimony is worth half of a man's. A man can divorce his wife by repudiation, whereas a woman must give justifications, some of which are difficult to prove. Child custody reverts to the father at a preset age; women who remarry lose custody of their children even before then; and sons inherit twice the share of daughters.

There has been much controversy about Muslim arbitration tribunals, which have attracted attention because they operate as tribunals under the Arbitration Act, making their rulings binding in UK law.
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Stop Stoning and Sharia Laws!

11 July is the International Day against Stoning – a day we would do well to mark especially given that Sakine Mohammadi Ashtiani faces imminent death by stoning for adultery.

Appealing on her behalf, her two children have said: “Today we reach out to the people of the world. It is now five years that we have lived in fear and in horror, deprived of motherly love. Is the world so cruel that it can watch this catastrophe and do nothing?”

Don’t stand by and watch. Let’s end this once and for all.

To show your condemnation against stoning and support for Sakine, during the week of 5-11 July, take stones to your city centres, universities, media outlets, workplaces… and put them in a public place, with a message in support of Sakine and against stoning and executions (http://iransolidarity.blogspot.com/2010/07/on-11-july-place-stones-in-public.html). Send letters of protest and sign a petition opposing stoning: http://iransolidarity.blogspot.com/2010/06/please-help-our-mother-return-home-stop.html.

With daily reports of such brutality, some will still not stop asserting that Sharia law is misunderstood and wrongly associated with medieval punishments - yet this is what Sharia’s penal code demands. The image of Sharia law is draconian because the reality is such.

But what of its civil code – that which is being widely implemented in Britain? A new report Sharia Law in Britain: A Threat to One Law for All and Equal Rights reveals the shocking effects of Sharia law on women and children in particular. To read Spokesperson Maryam Namazie’s piece on the new report in the Guardian’s law website, click here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/law/2010/jul/05/sharia-law-religious-courts. You can also read the report here: http://www.onelawforall.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/New-Report-Sharia-Law-in-Britain.pdf.

One Law for All will be sending the report to MPs, the Archbishop of Canterbury and others but needs your support to do this, particularly since media coverage on the report has been appalling. If you can, please purchase a copy or more of the new report so we can send it on to the Government and others free of charge. To purchase the report at £5.00 plus £2.00 Shipping and Handling each or to donate to the work of One Law for All, you may either send a cheque to our address below or pay via Paypal by visiting: http://www.onelawforall.org.uk/donate/.

Thank you for your support.

For further information contact:
Maryam Namazie
Spokesperson
One Law for All
BM Box 2387
London WC1N 3XX, UK
Tel: +44 (0) 7719166731
onelawforall@gmail.com
www.onelawforall.org.uk

TAGGED: HUMAN RIGHTS, LAW