A key suspect in the Christmas Day bombing which killed at least 38 people in Nigeria has escaped from custody, police have admitted.
Kabiru Sokoto – believed to be a member of the Islamist sect Boko Haram – was arrested on Saturday in the capital Abuja after police trailed him.
But the very next day he escaped as police attempted to search his house outside the capital.
[Rowan] Williams said he has been discussing with the UK government on how to support those living in fear because of the sect’s activities.
In a letter to the Archbishop and Primate of the Anglican Communion in Nigeria, Most Rev. Nicholas Okoh, which was read by his representative, the Bishop of Durham Rt. Revd Justin Welby, in Abuja, Williams said: “I write to assure you of my continuing prayers for you and for the work and ministry of the Anglican Church in Nigeria as unrest continues in many parts of Nigeria, both as a consequence of the national strikes and the continuing campaign by Boko Haram.
“The Rt Revd Justin Welby, newly enthroned as Bishop of Durham, comes to you, my brother in Christ, as my trusted emissary, and brings assurances of my prayers and concern for you and for your people. In addition to his time in Abuja he hopes to travel to Jos and to Kano. I have asked Bishop Welby to deliver my greetings to you in person when he meets with you as part of our continuing dialogue and mutual support.
The Coptic Orthodox Church will send out invitations to presidential hopefuls and all political parties, including Salafi ones, to attend the Christmas holy mass on 7 January, a papal source told Al-Masry Al-Youm.
The source said that Pope Shenouda III insisted on inviting both Muslim and Coptic Egyptians to the celebration.
Five years after Pope Benedict XVI’s Regensburg address that ignited protests around the Islamic world, the Catholic-Muslim Forum established to improve interfaith relations has said that what began as formal dialogue has become increasingly characterised by friendship.
The forum, which grew out of Muslim dissatisfaction with comments in Pope Benedict’s 2006 Regensburg speech, held its second round of theological consultations in Jordan last week. The fate of Middle Eastern Christian minorities amid the Arab Spring’s Islamist renaissance provided a sombre background to the meeting, much as perceived Christian misunderstandings about Islam preceded the first session of the forum at the Vatican in November 2008.
But increasing contacts between Catholic officials and Muslim scholars of the Common Word initiative, the 2007 Islamic dialogue appeal to Pope Benedict, have created bonds that helped both sides tackle sensitive issues.
Copts and other Christian comÂmunities in Egypt fear that the unexpectedly large turnout in the first of the three rounds of voting in parliamentary elections will be translated into a resounding success for the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party. Other parties representing more conservaÂtive Islamists ”” Salafis and Jihadis ”” are also likely to fare better than had been thought.
“The signs are very worrying,” a schoolteacher in Alexandria, Gabriel Ghali, said. “We are all worrying about what the huge queues will mean in terms of the votes cast, and we suspect it will mean a victory for the Islamic groups ”” and that’s bad news for us.”
Tens of thousands of Christians have emigrated since the overthrow of the Hosni Mubarak regime, and the outbreak of attacks on mem-bers of the community and their property.
A priest has been arrested in the Indian state of Kashmir and charged with promoting religious enmity and outraging religious feelings after he baptised 15 Muslim young men who had converted to Christianity.
The Rev. Chander Mani Khanna, rector of All Saints Church in Srinigar in the Church of North India’s Diocese of Amritsar was jailed on 19 Nov 2011 by police following complaints laid against him by a local Muslim leader.
While India does not have a law forbidding religious conversions, a police official told the Hindustan Times Mr. Khanna had been booked for having violated laws against offering “allurements” to converts and for breaching the peace by having baptised the young Muslims.
“I want to thank the Muslim Council of Wales and Saleem Kidwai, its Secretary General, in particular, for all he has done to foster good interfaith relationships in Wales over the last decade. Because of his commitment to our common Faith journey and because the fostering of good interfaith relationships has been high on the agenda of our own Welsh Government, I also want to thank the First Minister for continuing the sterling work of his predecessor Rhodri Morgan for this. Wales has not seen some of the problems encountered in other parts of the United Kingdom.
“The purpose of an evening such as this is for both Christians and Muslims to set out as cogently as they can, the kernel of what they believe so that we can understand one another better. What I have deeply valued over the last ten years in our relationship is the willingness to be totally open and honest with one another. We have not attempted to gloss over our differences and pretended that there aren’t any. Although our two faiths have much in common there are crucial differences as well and it honours no-one to pretend that that is not the case.”
Is there anything the Church can learn from the umma, the worldwide community of Muslims?
Yes. I mean, this is one of the reasons for dialogue. For instance, when I am talking to Muslims I am remind-ed very strongly of the biblical doctrine of the unity of God. Christians sometimes talk of the Trinity in a kind of trigger-happy fashion but, whatever else we may say about God, our starting-point must be that God is one.
Is there anything Christians can do to help the umma to rid itself of religious extremism?
Well, in a way it’s up to Muslims themselves, but yes, I think we can, for instance, in the context of dialogue, urge Muslims to say something about freedom of beÂlÂief: freedom to express one’s beliefs, freedom to change one’s beliefs. In my dialogue with [the ancient Islamic university] al-Azhar al-Sharif, which I led for the AnÂglican Communion for many years, freedom was alÂways on the agenda. Just before he died, I did a joint lecture in Cairo with the sheikh of al-Azhar, Sheikh [MuhÂamÂmad] Tantawi, and he said that people are free in Egypt to believe whatever they like – it is not the business of the state and it’s not the business of religion. I think that is a very significant adÂvance. Similarly, the Grand Mufti of Egypt has issued a very progressive fatwa declaring that apostasy from Islam is not punishable in this life.
Almost two weeks after the killing of around 25 Copts during an anti- discrimination demonstration in front of the headquarters of state TV on 9 October confusion continues to surround the carnage. There is no clear plan to punish the killers, who remain unidentified, and no guarantees that root cause of the problem is being addressed.
Immediately following the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces’ (SCAF) public denial during a press conference on 12 October of any culpability on the part of soldiers or military police in the killing of demonstrators protesting against the illegal demolition of churches, the Coptic Church questioned the council’s version of events. Speaking hours after the press conference, Pope Shenouda denied that military police had been forced to defend themselves after demonstrators shot at them. “The demonstrators were not armed,” he stated.
The position of the Church has received support from across civil society, with videos emerging that purport to reveal the details of bloody Sunday….
Along with countless Christians and Muslims alike throughout the world, I want to express my deep concern about the current situation in Egypt as it affects all our Christian brothers and sisters and to promise our continuing prayers and support especially for His Holiness Pope Shenuda and the community he serves. In modern times the significant Coptic Christian population in Egypt has been free from repression ; Muslims and Christians have happily shared a loyalty to the one Egyptian state….
Mecca, we have a problem.
It is not America, nor Europe, and no, it is certainly not Israel.
The problem is Christian persecution. Some 14 centuries after the prophet Mohammed wrote, “Christians are my citizens, and by God, I hold out against anything that displeases them,” Christian persecution has become the norm in too many Muslim-majority nations.
A few days ago, 25 Christians were killed in Egypt after state television falsely accused them of creating violence ”” while they peacefully protested violence against their churches. Rather than fight for the rights of Christians, the Muslim mob attacked them.
Muslim extremists have sent text messages to at least 10 church leaders in Khartoum saying they are planning to target Christian leaders, buildings and institutions, Christian sources in Khartoum said.
“We want this country to be purely an Islamic state, so we must kill the infidels and destroy their churches all over Sudan,” said one text message circulating in Khartoum last month. The text messages were sent in July and August.
The central Nigerian city of Jos was the site of violent Christian-Muslim clashes as Ramadan drew to a close last week.
Fighting Aug. 29 left some 20 dead and some 50 wounded; the next day, another 10 were killed. And dozens of cars, homes and businesses were destroyed and set on fire.
Although the particulars of the incidents are unknown, according to the local media, including the daily The Vanguard, pandemonium broke out after a dispute between groups of young Christians and Muslims. “There was a disagreement between a group of Muslims who were heading toward a particular area, and another group of young Christians who went to pray in the same area. A discussion over who owned the area broke out,” Archbishop Ignatius Ayau Kaigama of Jos told the Fides agency. He added, however, that he did not have all the details.
In Syracuse, as in countless other communities, 9/11 set off a phenomenon that may seem counterintuitive in an era of increasingly vocal Islamophobia. A terrorist attack that provoked widespread distrust and hostility toward Muslims also brought Muslims in from the margins of American religious life ”” into living rooms, churches, synagogues and offices where they had never set foot before.
American Christians and Jews reached out to better understand Islam and ”” they will admit ”” to find out firsthand whether the Muslims in their midst were friends or foes. Muslims also reached out, newly conscious of their insularity, aware of the suspicions of their neighbors, determined that the ambassadors of Islam should not be the terrorists.
“Before 9/11 we were somewhat timid,” said Saad Sahraoui, president of the Islamic Society of Central New York, the largest mosque in Syracuse, when the attacks occurred in 2001. “We just kept to ourselves, just concerned with our families and our children….
Over the last few weeks of prayer, fasting and reflection it must have been very difficult to watch the growing unrest and rioting in many of the major cities in the United Kingdom. The tragic deaths of Haroon Jahan, Shahzad Ali and Abdul Muzavir in Birmingham occurred at the darkest moment of those days. Their families and friends suffered horrific bereavement and shock, but somehow in the midst of this chaos, they brought about a change. On the day after their murder, Tariq Jahan, the father of one of the boys who died, showed immense dignity in calling for restraint in his local community. His call for peace and unity was one of the decisive moments during those days and was a gift in Ramadan that gave hope to many not just in Birmingham but all over the United Kingdom and beyond….
Clashes broke out between Christians and Muslims in tense central Nigeria on Monday, with witnesses reporting a number of deaths as well as vehicles and at least two shops set ablaze.
The head of a search-and-rescue team for the Muslim community in the city of Jos, where the clashes occurred, reported nine dead and 106 people wounded, but there was no official confirmation.
Information commissioner for Plateau state Yiljap Abraham said “there are casualties, but the police will give that later.”
“You have seen the strong man judged in a bed in Egypt,” he told the two dozen immigrant members of his congregation who braved the city’s checkpoints to make it to Anglican Mass on Friday. “And so it works that the weak can overthrow the strong,” he added. “This is what is happening in our Middle East.”
In a city of tapped phone lines and ubiquitous government informers, the weekly Mass at the Church of Christ the King is a rare sanctuary: a place to speak freely with a group of Tripoli residents about the anxious, ever-shifting mood of the city.
“When NATO bombs at night, I hear my neighbors clap and cheer ”˜bravo,’ and in the morning they are with the rebels,” a leading parishioner said, speaking on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals from the government of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi. “People are very, very down, and they are depending entirely on NATO.”
Archbishop Akinola called on the Church of Nigeria and “all other well-meaning Nigerians to wake up and appreciate the situation.”
“Well-meaning Nigerians must resist all of this by all lawful means and the National Assembly must see the whole thing as an affront” to the Nigerian constitution “which states unambiguously that no particular religion shall be adopted as state religion.”
“Government must take decisive action and promptly cancel everything about the proposed Sharia banking,” the archbishop said, imploring Christians to “rise to defend our faith which is currently on trial” from pro-Muslim government policies and violent Islamist terror attacks.
Influential Muslims on this East African island have begun building what appears to be a hotel on a 100-year-old burial site owned by an Anglican church, Christian leaders said.
Church leaders with ownership papers for the land told Compass they are disturbed that authorities have taken no action since they filed a police complaint in December about the seizure of the burial site three kilometers (nearly two miles) from Zanzibar city’s airport. Tanzania’s Zanzibar archipelago, including the largest island of Zanzibar (officially known as Unguja), is 99.9 percent Muslim.
What is your view on the vexed issue of Islamic banking in Nigeria?
It is a time bomb that is about to explode. This nation is secular in nature. It is a constitutional stipulation that no religion should be adopted as a state religion. The fact remains that Christians cannot claim to be the sole owners of Nigeria. Muslims and African Traditional Religion practitioners cannot equally claim to be owners of Nigeria. If that is the case, foisting or attempting to foist the religious practices of a particular religion on this nation is a time bomb that will explode.
The forty-year-old Virgin Mary Church on Cairo’s al-Wahda Street””the name means unity, or oneness””looks striking these days. Its cream and white façade is unscathed by the dust and smog that otherwise blanket neighboring buildings and the rest of the city, and inside, its walls and floors glisten with newly laid cappuccino-colored marble. The church, its guardians say, has never looked better. “Ever, in its entire history.”
On May 8, this church, in the impoverished Cairo neighborhood of Imbaba, a ten-minute drive from Tahrir Square, was a scene of devastation. It had been ravaged by flames and its insides gutted, smashed, looted, and charred after clashes broke out between Muslims and Christians over the case of a Coptic woman named Abeer Fakhri, an alleged convert to Islam whom ultraconservative Salafis had claimed was being held against her will at the nearby Church of St. Mina, which was also attacked. Fifteen people were killed in the violence and almost two hundred injured.
The attack was one of a series against Egypt’s Coptic Christian minority in the weeks since President Hosni Mubarak stepped down on February 11. Since then, widespread and escalating crime has gripped the country….
A decision by Prime Minister Najib Razak to meet with Pope Benedict XVI on Monday signals a wish to mend ties with Malaysia’s Christians following a series of incidents, including the firebombing of churches, that have strained interfaith relations in this Muslim-majority nation, analysts say.
Mr. Najib is scheduled to visit Benedict at Castel Gandolfo, the pope’s summer residence near Rome, for talks that are expected to touch on the possibility of Malaysia establishing diplomatic relations with the Vatican.
Primate of Anglican Communion, Nigeria, Most Revd. Nicholas Okoh, has described the introduction of Islamic banking by the Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, Mr. Lamido Sanusi, as a religious oppressive instrument and a tool for social coercion of the poor to convert to Islam.
Okoh, who spoke to newsmen, yesterday, at Agbarha-Otor, Ughelli North Local Government Area, Delta State, said it was a follow up to demands by Boko Haram for the application of Sharia all over the country.
He said: “In 10 years from now, it would have grown and matured to what it is intended to be- a religious oppressive instrument and tool for social coercion of the poor to convert to Islam. It is heavily skewed to put other non-interest banking at disadvantage.
A petition of more than 2,000 signatures was handed into 10 Downing Street last week in opposition to Pakistan’s controversial Blasphemy Laws.
Organised by Wilson Chowdhry and the British Pakistani Christian Association, the petition’s aim is to protect Christians and other religious minorities in Pakistan.
Angry reactions have continued to trail the planned introduction of Islamic banking system in the country by the governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, Mallam Sanusi Lamido Sanusi.
The condemnation was part of a 14-point communiqué issued at the end of the third session of the first synod of the Diocese of Oru, Anglican Communion, and signed by the Bishop and Synod Secretary, Rt. Rev. Geoffrey Chukwunenye and Ven. H.U Nnaoma respectively.
At least 10 people have been killed in a series of attacks blamed on Islamist militants in the north-eastern Nigerian city of Maiduguri, officials have said.
Military commander Gen Jack Nwaogbo said five people were killed when a bomb exploded on Sunday inside a bar frequented by soldiers and policemen.
Gunmen also shot dead four people late on Saturday and one person on Sunday.
The five-page code of conduct, which has been under negotiation since 2005, was unveiled at a Geneva news conference by the World Council of Churches (WCC), a senior Roman Catholic prelate and the World Evangelical Alliance (WEA).
It urges Christians wanting “to share the good news of God’s kingdom” — missionary work or simply publicly testifying to their faith — “to build relations of respect and trust with all religions” and adapt their approaches to local conditions.
Pakistan’s blasphemy laws were introduced in the 1980s. Though they were supposed to be used to protect the religious sensitivities of the country’s Muslim majority, in practice they are often used to persecute religious minorities.
In 2009 almost 100 people were charged with blasphemy, including 67 Ahmadi Muslims and 17 Christians.
Many of those accused or suspected of blasphemy have been assaulted or tortured. Some people detained in prisons on blasphemy charges have been killed by fellow inmates or prison wardens. Others suspected of blasphemy, but not under arrest, have been unlawfully killed without the police taking any action to protect them.