Author: Ruth Gledhill, Religion
Correspondent
Publication: The Times Online
Date: November 17, 2004
URL: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-1361981,00.html
The head of Britain's race watchdog
urged Muslim leaders yesterday to speak out more against terrorism and
called on them to do more to support the rights of Muslim women.
Trevor Phillips, chairman of the
Commission for Racial Equality, said that Muslim protestations that Islam
is opposed to the crimes carried out in its name could be taken seriously
only if those assertions were acted on in Britain.
His remarks aroused immediate protests
from Muslim leaders, who said that they had been assiduous in condemning
terrorism. A senior insider said that Mr Phillips's remarks on this issue
could be interpreted as Islamophobic, although he said that there was much
else in the speech that was good.
Speaking to an audience of Muslim
academics at the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies, Mr Phillips said: "Though
I know it is irritating to many of you, and feels unjust that you have
to do this time and time again, it remains important for mainstream Muslim
leaders to point out that British Muslims have no time for terrorism, and
call on anyone who practises it in the name of Islam to cease."
He praised the work of the Muslim
Council of Britain in combating terrorism. This year the council took the
unprecedented step of writing to every mosque urging worshippers to exercise
vigilance against terrorism. However, Mr Phillips went on to speak out
about the issue of women in Islam. "It remains crucial for Muslim leaders
to remind the rest of us that true Islam does not compel young women to
travel thousands of miles to be given away by their families to men they
do not know and to whom they do not want to be married. It remains vital
for Muslim leadership to denounce those who claim that they have a cultural
right to impose circumcision on young women."
He added: "Muslim protestations
that the faith is opposed to the depredations and crimes carried out in
its name . . . and that it regards equality of women as intrinsic to Islam
can only be taken seriously if we see those assertions being made flesh
here in our communities."
