Tag: Hilath blog

Self-exiled blogger Hilath speaks at UN Human Rights Council

Maldivian journalist and blogger Ismail ‘Hilath’ Rasheed last week spoke at the United Nation’s Palace of Nations during the 21st session of the Human Rights Council (HRC).

In a side event dedicated to the Maldives, Hilath spoke of his fears of rising fundamentalism in his home country and called for the international community to keep a close watch on the Maldives to ensure the protection of human rights and democratic freedoms.

“Maldives may be a small country but it is not insignificant. It lies at a strategic crossroads and the cultural and political invasion of Maldives by Saudi-funded Wahhabi extremism will definitely have regional and global repercussions,” said Hilath.

Hilath was forced to flee the Maldives earlier this year after an assassination attempt left him within millimetres of death when a group of men slashed his throat just yards from his home in Male’.

Hilath later attributed the assassination attempt to Islamic radicals who had threatened his life on numerous previous occasions.

As well as making international headlines, Hilath’s case has been championed by both Reporters Without Borders (RSF) and, more recently, by the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH).

Both organisations called for an immediate investigation into the attack, the latter criticising the authorities for failing to adequately investigate the incident.

“Until 2003, for the past 800 years, the Maldives had been a moderate and liberal Islamic country,” said Hilath, whose speech is also available on his blog which has been blocked by the authorities since November.

“However, in the last years of [Maumoon Abdul] Gayoom, due to poverty and oppression, and also as a result of the forced imposition on the Maldivian people of Gayoom’s own version of Islam, extremism took a hold, and though it is still a minority, it is a very vocal and formidable one that both [Mohamed] Nasheed’s and [Mohamed] Waheed’s governments have been unable to tackle,” he continued.

“But a stark difference has been that while Nasheed’s government officially acknowledged there was an extremist problem in Maldives, Waheed is refusing to acknowledge the problem. While Nasheed sought to keep extremism in check by bringing them into his government, in the form of the Adhaalath Party, Waheed came into power on the back of extremism, and therefore is giving free reign to extremists,” said Hilath.

Prior to this year’s transfer of presidential power, Hilath suffered a fractured skull after an attack during a silent protest in support of religious tolerance last December.

He was later arrested in relation to the protest after the religiously conservative Adhaalath Party (AP) wrote a letter to the police.

This prompted Amnesty International to declare him a prisoner of conscience and to demand his immediate release.

The 2008 constitution defines the Maldives as a one hundred percent Sunni Islamic nation and makes observance of the faith a prerequisite of citizenship.

“What is worrying is that while Nasheed allowed extremists to spread their propaganda through private channels, Waheed’s government is directly sanctioning the promotion of the extremist agenda through official religious channels,” said Hilath.

“The Adhaalath Party, under whom extremists operate, and under whose umbrella the Islamic Affairs Ministry has been under both Nasheed and Waheed, is now using Friday prayer sermons, also known as khuthubas, to spew bigotry, mysogyny, homophobia, xenophobia, racism, sexism and other sorts of discrimination, and to issue fatwas or religious rulings proclaiming the arts and humanities, such as photography, art, music, singing, dancing and acting as haram or sinful,” he added.

Two days after Hilath’s speech in Geneva, the Islamic Ministry distributed a circular calling for the banning of mixed gender dancing.

This news put the Maldives in the global media spotlight for the second time this month after the sentencing of a 16 year old girl to 100 lashes for fornication – in accordance with Islamic Sharia – had already made international headlines.

Last Friday also saw a gathering of religious protesters outside of the United Nations (UN) building to register their anger at the anti-Islamic film “Innocence of Muslims”.

Protesters burned the American flag and waved banners, one of which read “Maldives: Future graveyard of Americans and Jews”.

Repeated chants were heard urging President Waheed to return America’s US$20,000 contribution to restore the historical Buddhist artifacts in the museum, which were destroyed by a mob of vandals during February’s political turmoil.

Some protesters stated that if the idols were restored, they would promptly destroy them again.

In response to the issue of dancing, President’s spokesperson Abbas Adil Riza told the Associated Free Press (AFP) this week that the circular was not legally enforceable and that the Maldives would always be “a very tolerant society”.

“It is deeply regrettable that both Nasheed and Waheed have done little or nothing to curb extremism as every political party in Maldives seems afraid of extremists,” said Hilath.

“What is really depressing now is that since Waheed’s government is backed by Islamic extremists, who in turn have been backed by rogue police and military officers, extremists are now acting with impunity,” he added.

“The only hope we have in saving the Maldives is by the international community keeping a close watch. I, therefore, welcome UN Human Rights Commissioner Ms. Navi Pillay’s decision to assign a Human Rights Advisor to the Maldives as rising Islamic extremism is causing serious setbacks to human rights, freedom of expression and democracy in the Maldives,” he said.

After visiting the Maldives last November, Pillay called for a moratorium on corporal punishment and criticised the Muslim-only clause in the constitution.

Protesters subsequently gathered outside the UN building, calling for Pillay’s own arrest and flogging.

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Blog crack-down “is just the beginning”, warns censored blogger

The website of controversial Maldivian blogger Ismail ‘Hilath’ Rasheed has been shut down by Communications Authority of the Maldives (CAM) on the order of the Ministry of Islamic Affairs. The Ministry made the request on the grounds that the site contained anti-Islamic material, a CAM statement read.

CAM Director Abdulla Nafeeg Pasha told Minivan News the Islamic Ministry has the power to regulate website content.

Pasha did not wish to comment on the procedures for closing down a website, but said “if the ministry tells us to shut it down, that’s what we do. We do not make the decision.”

Once closed, Pasha explained, a website can only be re-opened by order of the court.

Islamic Minister Abdul Majeed Abdul Bari had not returned calls at time of press, and Permanent Secretary of the Ministry Mohamed Didi had not responded to enquiries.

In a statement issued today Hilath defended his blog as an expression of his Sufi Muslim identity.

“I am a Sufi Muslim and there is nothing on my website that contradicts Sufi Islam. I suspect my website was reported by intolerant Sunni Muslims and Wahhabis,” he claimed.

Under the Maldivian constitution every Maldivian is a Sunni Muslim. The constitution also provides for freedom of expression, with Article 27 reading “Everyone has the right to freedom of thought and the freedom to communicate opinions and expression in a manner that is not contrary to any tenet of Islam.”

New regulations published by the government in September, enforcing the 1994 Religious Unity Act, bans the media from producing or publicising programs, talking about or disseminating audio “that humiliates Allah or his prophets or the holy Quran or the Sunnah of the Prophet (Mohamed) or the Islamic faith.”

“This also includes the broadcasting of material (on other religions) produced by others and recording of such programs by the local broadcaster, and broadcasting such material by the unilateral decision of the local broadcaster,” the regulations stipulate. Under the Act, the penalty for violation is 2-5 years imprisonment.

Hilath claimed he was being censored for expressing his version of Islam, and called for more freedom of interpretation within the faith.

“I call upon all concerned to amend the clause in the constitution which requires all Maldivians to be Sunni Muslims only,” his statement read.

“‘Unto you your religion and unto me my religion,’ and ‘There is no compulsion in religion’,” he said, quoting Qur’an 109:6 and 2:256.

Hilath believes the block of his website has a political edge. “If Sunni Muslims are the conservatives, then the Sufi Muslims are the liberals,” he told Minivan News. “I think this is a conservative attack on the site. They think if you’re not a Sunni, you’re an unbeliever.”

Hilath said he would approach the issue from its constitutional roots. “If I want to unlock my blog I will have to go to court, where they will say I’m an unbeliever which is illegal. So I will have fight the larger issue of the constitution,” he said.

The label of ‘unbeliever’ was tantamount to ‘enemy of the state’, he said, adding that bloggers such as himself were afraid of the consequences of being labelled as such. Hilath is one of only a few Maldivian bloggers who write under their own names.

In January 2009 the Islamic Ministry shut down several blogs for allegedly publishing anti-Islamic material. The action closely followed then-newly elected President Mohamed Nasheed’s statement that the Maldives would be a haven of free expression.

Hilath said he was ashamed of the government’s maintenance of its original declaration for a liberal democracy. “I know the President said this was a liberal democracy, but I am ashamed that the Islamic Ministry has assumed so much power,” he said. “I call upon the president to address this issue.”

A 2009 review endorsed by UNESCO’s International Programme for the Development of Communication defined freedom of expression in the digital age as dependent on “neutral” networks “in the sense that the flow of content should not be influenced by financial, cultural or political reasons.”

“In particular, in the case of filtering, the origin of filtering lists and the underlying criteria and processes should be publicly available,” read the report.

The report made three recommendations for the Maldives:

1) To stop blocking websites as was done in March 2009;

2) If blocking is necessary, it should only be pursued following a favorable court decision;

3) To foster open discussions on internet regulation among citizens, government members, NGOs and international parties.

To Hilath’s knowledge, this is the first time a websites has been blocked since January 2009. He believes his website is part of a “bigger conservative fight against the [ruling] Maldivian Democratic Party” and is only the beginning of a new wave of censorship.

“This time I think the conservatives behind the Islamic Ministry think they can put pressure on the government to see all these things as anti-Islamic, like with the SAARC monument issue. More blogs will probably be blocked. I think this is just the beginning.”

The opposition to Hilath’s blog “is a minority of the population, but it’s very vocal and active,” he said. By contrast the younger generation, which composes approximately half of the Maldives population, may take a different view, he claimed.

“The younger generation is educated and enlightened about religion and freedom and Islamic principles. I think the majority will support my move. But few feel free to speak out,” he said.

Mohamed Nazeef, President of Maldives Media  Council (MMC), said he was not familiar with the blog in question. However he said that the media – even bloggers – were subject to the society it served.

“Even when you talk about democracy there are ethics, and you have to respect the prevailing culture of the country and the needs of its people. Even in the name of freedom there are boundaries. That’s why we have a media code of ethics.”

When asked whether a citizen’s blog could arguably represent or oppose the greater good, Nazeef explained that a balance between people and the law was important.

“The constitution must be respected because people are under the constitution. Nobody is above the law. If you want to do something that is not allowed you have to properly amend the law.”

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