"Jane" <pushlinque@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:3osyd.13280$Z%3.799236@news20.bellglobal.com...

Note how this muslim woman refers to "sixth century religious ideals"!

Dec. 22, 2004. 01:00 AM

Sharia opponents fight on
`Faith-based tribunals' evoke fear, women say

Court challenge possible if amendments pass

LYNDA HURST
FEATURE WRITER

The fight to stop Muslim religious law being used to settle family
disputes
in Ontario is far from over.
Despite a report this week saying amendments to the Arbitration Act will
prevent abuse, the two women who spearheaded the opposition vow they'll
carry on the battle.
"The mere suggestion of `faith-based,' or sharia tribunals, causes an
atmosphere of fear among women from Islamic countries," says Homa
Arjomand,
head of the International Campaign To Stop Sharia Law in Canada.
Arjomand, who fled as a refugee from Iran's fundamentalist regime in

now counsels immigrant women, many of them Muslim victims of domestic
violence.
She says if the province accepts the controversial proposals of former
attorney-general Marion Boyd, it will face a confrontation in the

and possibly a Charter of Rights challenge from her organization.
The report says no evidence was found to show that women are being
discriminated against in the unofficial "faith-based arbitrations"

occurring. Boyd told the Toronto Star she had heard only from women who
had
bad experiences while living in "full sharia regimes," not Canada.
Arjomand says there are indeed cases here.
"Our lawyers are studying the decisions of several arbitrations and will
bring them to court to expose how women are victimized by sixth-century
religious traditions," she says.
Her group is now raising funds to return to Toronto a woman who had been
sent back to Pakistan by her husband after he divorced her and was

custody of their three children in an unofficial sharia arbitration.
Paternal custody is customary in Islamic family law.
Arjomand is asking Muslim women who've experienced similar rulings to

courage and come forward. They can contact the campaign
(http://www.nosharia.com) in confidence.

BAAAAAAAAAAAAA
But check out the video of their leader, Homa Arjomand. She is a filthy
anti-Mohammad Iranian escapie.
http://www.nosharia.com/Homa-tvo.wmv

She's just spreading propaganda lies ***** about seeing her friend
getting stoned to death under sharia law.
And so are you, idiot anti-Islam activist supporter.

IJ.

(Iranian Jean Gueron :-)

In a letter to Premier Dalton McGuinty, Alia Hogben, executive director

the 900-member Canadian Council of Muslims, says Boyd completely ignored
its
views and input:
"As believing Muslim women, we are in complete support of religious
accommodation, but accommodation has a limit when it affects the lives

women and children."
The council is asking for a meeting in early January with McGuinty,
Attorney-General Michael Bryant and Sandra Pupatello, minister

for women's issues, none of whom has commented on the report. The
government
is studying the report.
Boyd was asked by the provincial government to review the 1991

Act and assess whether a plan by the Islamic Institute for Civil Justice
to
use the guiding principles of their faith in settling marital and
inheritance disputes should be halted.
Hogben thinks Ontario should follow Quebec's lead in removing family law
from religious arbitrations. The safeguards it proposes instead - among
them, that participants must review in advance the faith-based

to
be used and that arbitrators file decisions with the province - are

inadequate, she says:
"Whose faith-based principles? Who among the various section of the

community will decide?"
Half of Canada's 650,000 Muslims live in Ontario and represent a range

Islamic sects, including Shia, Sunni and Sufi. Their interpretations of
sharia, the body of laws that evolved after the death of Mohammed in AD
632,
vary widely.
Hogben and Arjomand say they warned Boyd that some fundamentalist groups
look on the right to use Muslim law in family matters as only the start

a
longer-term campaign - to create an independent legal system for
Muslim-Canadians.
Boyd says one of the "real issues" she faced in three months of
consultations was the "aspirations of some individuals," but she was
assured
that these are viewed as "inappropriate" by the broader Muslim

However, "if it turns out we see an erosion of rights, the government

have the data it needs to step in," she says.
"It stepped in with the practice of female circumcision in the early
1990s,
saying it was not acceptable under Canadian law."
The Muslim community has a responsibility to eradicate "cultural
practices"
that are not, in fact, based on Islam, she says. But Ottawa and the
province
also have to improve the education of new immigrants of both sexes on
their
legal rights in Canada.
Boyd is confident that a majority of Muslims will support her
recommendations.
As for critics who pledge to carry on the fight: "I would hate for them

think we don't understand their fears." But formalizing the arbitration
process may mean "mitigating some of the injustices."
Writer Sally Armstrong, who has documented the lives of Muslim women in
several countries, says if Ontario proceeds, "it will open a Pandora's

and the consequences will be grave. Sharia doesn't work.
"Religious laws belong in the mosque, the synagogue, the church - not in
the
legal system."