Underprivileged – World Muslims Community - Voluntary Organization

OCTOBER 4, 2013 (New York) – Indian authorities should properly investigate all crimes, including allegations of sexual assault and gang rape during last month’s communal violence in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, Human Rights Watch said today. Authorities should also develop a plan for prompt relief, return or resettlement, and reparations for the riot-displaced and create a secure environment for investigation and prosecution. Reports of sexual assault have started to surface following the September communal violence in Muzaffar nagar district in Uttar Pradesh that killed more than 50 people and displaced tens of thousands. Many, including girls, are still missing. So far, five criminal complaints of gang rape and two cases of sexual harassment have been registered by the local Uttar Pradesh police. Indian activists who have visited riot-affected communities report that other Muslim women may have suffered sexual assault, including rape, but have not registered crimina...

Sunday 25 August 2013 Fresh sectarian violence broke out in north-western Burma late on Saturday when Buddhist mobs burned down dozens of homes and shops following rumours that a young woman had been sexually assaulted by a Muslim man. There were no reports of injuries. Myanmar's radical monk Wirathu, whose anti-Muslim rhetoric has placed him at the centre of rising religious violence, said on his Facebook page that hundreds of people took part in the riot on the outskirts of Kantbalu. A crowd surrounded the police station demanding that the suspect be handed over, said a police officer from the area, who asked not to be named because he did not have authority to speak to the media. When police refused, they started setting buildings on fire, he said. About 35 houses and 12 shops, most belonging to Muslims, were destroyed before calm was restored, he said. Predominantly Buddhist Burma has been grappling with sectarian violence since the country's military rulers han...

Fake encounters: A blot on Indian democracy With India’s premier investigating agency calling the Ishrat Jahan killing a fake encounter and filing its first charge sheet in the case against seven police officers, our political class has found yet another opportunity to indulge in scoring brownie points over each other. Jahan, a 19-year-old college student, was gunned down on June 15, 2004 along with three men by a police and intelligence squad near Ahmedabad city in Gujarat. In its chargesheet filed on June 3, the Central Bureau of Investigation refuted state government’s claim that Jahan and the three men were terrorists heading to assassinate chief minister Narendra Modi. The agency also claimed that the police officers abducted the four days earlier and shot them in cold blood on the early morning of June 15, 2004. A deluge of opinions beamed live through national television channels and on social media platforms seem to be focused on ascertaining the involvement of Gujarat’s...

Jan 20, 2013, 02.15 RSS, BJP camps promoting Hindu terror: Sushilkumar Shinde JAIPUR/ NEW DELHI: Union home minister Sushil Kumar Shinde has accused the BJP and the RSS of fanning Hindu terrorism, a charge which drew angry reaction from both of them. "Reports have come during investigation that BJP and RSS conduct terror training camps to spread terrorism... Bombs were planted in Samjhauta express, Mecca Masjid and also a blast was carried out in Malegaon. "We will have to think about it seriously and will have to remain alert," Shinde said at the AICC meeting in Jaipur on Sunday. As his remarks were slammed by RSS and BJP which termed them as "dangerous" and accused Congress of indulging in "destructive politics", Shinde stuck to his stand, saying, "This has come so many times in the papers... It is not a new thing that I have said today. "This is saffron terrorism that I have talked about. It is the same thing and nothing new. It...

The remains of dozens of Palestinians killed by Israelis in fighting following the 1948 foundation of the Israeli state have been found in a mass grave in Tel Aviv’s Jaffa district. An official at the Muslim cemetery there told AFP that the grisly find occurred on Wednesday when ground subsided as workers carried out renovations, revealing six chambers full of skeletons. Jaffa fisherman Atar Zeinab, 80, says that as a teenager during the final months of fighting in 1948 he helped to collect the Arab dead in the area south of Jaffa and bring them for hasty burial in the cemetery, the area’s main graveyard. “I carried to the cemetery 60 bodies during a period of three or four months,” he told AFP. “We used to find the people in the street and most of the time we didn’t know who they were.” He said that the danger of being hit by flying bullets or grenade fragments was such that bodies were dumped one on top of the other in existing family crypts in the cemetery, contrary to M...

Myanmar's government has called for calm after mobs burned down a Muslim orphanage, a mosque and shops during a new eruption of religious violence in the northeastern Shan state. At least one person has died and four others were injured, state television said. Authorities imposed a curfew late on Tuesday in Lashio, about 700km northeast of Yangon, after a mob of 200 local residents surrounded a local police station demanding they hand over a Muslim detainee. Nay Win, 48, a Muslim from a nearby township, was arrested after allegedly setting fire to Aye Aye Win, 24, a Shan Buddhist, earlier in the day after the two had an altercation at a petrol station, Lashio police said. The woman was admitted to hospital. "According to witnesses, she was not burned seriously but has injuries on her face and arms," Sai Sam Min, a member of parliament from Lashio, said. Jim Della-Giacoma, of the International Crisis Group, talks about the latest violence in Myanmar Al Jazee...

Burma’s ‘hidden genocide’: A rare visit to Rohingya refugee camps In western Burma, 140,000 people have been forced from their homes by communal violence. Their camps are now at risk of being inundated by monsoons. GEMUNU AMARASINGHE / AP A Rohingya man pushes a rickshaw leaving a camp for displaced Rohingya people in Sittwe, northwestern Rakhine State, Myanmar, Thursday, May 16, 2013. Some members of the Rohingya minority started to evacuate for safer shelters ahead of Cyclone Mahasen, while others refused to leave, mistrusting the government. RAKHINE STATE, BURMA—As a mob of Arakanese Buddhists descended on their village, Ma Nu, 52, and her family pushed off in their fishing boat. “The day before, we were given leaflets, telling us to leave,” says Ma Nu, a Rohingya Muslim. “We lived together for decades. We never thought anything like this could happen.” From the water, they watched the violence unfold. Stragglers were attacked and houses were looted...