Libyan intelligence officials have detained and tortured four Christians for converting from Islam. The Christians have been imprisoned for the past seven weeks in Tripoli, Libya's capital.
Libya's External Security Organization appear to be responsible for the detention and torture of the Christians. The families have been barred from visiting the converts by security agents. It is believed that the converts are under severe physical and psychological pressure to force them to reveal the names of other Christian converts.
The leader of Libya, Mouammar Kadhafi believes that the Bible has been falsified to remove the references to predictions of the Prophet Mohamed. Afrique en Ligne reports that Kadhafi spoke during a commemoration ceremony for the birth of the Prophet Mohamed, claiming that:
Quran showed that there did not exist any differences between Islam and Moses and his closest followers because they were Moslems.
“If they had lived during the era of Mohamed, they would have believed in him. Likewise, there is no problem with Jesus and the other prophets, all of them being Moslems and Mohamed the seal of the prophets," Kadhafi said.
He said the discord was “between us and those who refused to follow Mohamed who is the messenger of the Jews, Christians and the entire mankind”.
Afrique en Ligne reports that Kadhafi also claimed that Islam had not been spread by force. I would add that he forgot to mention that Islam holds its religious adherents by force, at least in Libya.
Let's call him on this. Go to International Christian Concern and see their ideas for calling and writing to get these converts released.
Hat Tip: Women Against Shariah
Posts
4 comments:
Please find these two articles that I wrote after I read about this case:
http://antifo.wordpress.com/2009/03/14/fear-of-torture-is-no-phobia/
http://antifo.wordpress.com/2009/03/15/speaking-about-torture-must-be-possible/
Dear Antifo,
I love what you are writing.
Dear Perpetua,
you may look to other english-language texts which I think are worthwhile to read for anyone who deals as a christian with human rights (HR) topics:
http://antifo.wordpress.com/about/
You will find that the texts (1)-(4) are actually not related to persecution of christians, but they helped me greatly to understand how wonderful one can juggle with HRs to make an argument. Outcome are the two texts that I posted before.
(1) is from the main-author of the HR and sheds light on the idea folks had in mind in 1948
(2) is from a guy who works since years for IHEU (atheist/humanist NGO). The text explains what happend in the UNHRC session of March 28th 2008
(3) is a speech from the new Moscow Patriarch Kirill and was held in March 18th 2008 at the UNHRC. In this speech he politically justifies the need for a christian exegesis of the HR
(4) is the Russian declaraion of HRs
Text number (7) in the german language list is not yet translated. It deals with certain questions that arise from the Durban II challenge. I would be glad to tranlate this as well, yet I feel there is a need to further think jointly about the overall HR topic.
For that reason I would like to leverage my stuff into a fitting english language web community. My hope is that by doing so we could grow a culture that creates reasonalbe papers which argue from a christian perspective.
IC XC + NIKA,
Antifo
Those, who claimed to be in jail in Libya because of their conversion.
We share the same believes and ideas. Actually we love all religions,
God told us, in the holy Quran, to believe in him and in his prophets
and in his holy books.
I deny, refuse and condemn any news which describe our leader, in a
negative ways. Some news say that : Muammar Al-Qaddafi is behind their
arrest, and that he doesn't like Christians. We , Libyans, know who
Al-Qaddafi is. Al-Qaddafi's ideas and philosophy is bigger than events
like these. In Libya. We call him the leader. He is a revolutionary
man. His ideas are brilliant. He is an open minded and against any
kind of discrimination be it racial or even religious discrimination.
Al- Qaddafi is man who have a philosophy. He is a philosopher and
thinker. We love Al-Qaddafi, and we have learned many things from him.
He is a nice man. We love him. I deny any news that say he is behind
the arrest of converted people from Islam. We know that he is a kind
man. He respects all religions. We used to listen to his speeches and
enjoy the things he talks about. We wish him well and may God bless
him and his family. After all his philosophy and ideas are proved to
be more wise than many world leaders and presidents who brought
destruction to the world such as president Bush's ideas and
philosophy.
As for my cousins, I do not know how they got involved and therefore
were jailed.
I hope that they be released soon.
Blessings
NewBorn Libyan
Post a Comment