Mauritania condemns man to death for 'insulting the prophet'

[Eugene]

Source: Reuters

Mauritania condemns man to death for 'insulting the prophet'

BY KISSIMA DIAGANA
NOUAKCHOTT Thu Dec 25, 2014 2:47pm EST

(Reuters) - Mauritania on Thursday condemned a man to death for "insulting the prophet", a human rights group said, a day after the country opened the trial of an anti-slavery activist.

Mohamed Cheikh Ould Mkhaitir, 28, was arrested a year ago for writing an article about the Prophet Mohammad and the caste system, an extremely sensitive subject in a West African country with deep social and racial divisions.

He claims his article has been misinterpreted.

The prosecution asked for the death penalty to be carried out in accordance with Islamic sharia law and recommended he be shot. Mauritania, a poor country straddling Arab and black Africa, last applied the death penalty in 1987.

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Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/12/25/us-mauritania-justice-execution-idUSKBN0K30OP20141225

[cbayer]

1. The conflict appears to be around the issue of slavery and those that oppose it.

I wonder what he actually wrote.

[rug]

2. Some background:

Religion, Race, and Repression in Mauritania: The Ould Mkhaitir Apostasy Affair

May 29 2014
by Alice Bullard

On 2 January 2014, Mohamed Ould Cheikh Mohamed Ould Mkhaitir, a young Mauritanian engineer from the northern industrial city of Nouadhibou, published a denunciation of caste-based racism, which he framed as a call for religious reform. He dared to challenge the discrimination against Moulamines, the lowest of the low in Mauritanian society, and did so by provocatively criticizing some of the Prophet Mohammed’s acts. The government perceived his demand that Mauritanians cleanse their religion of racism as a fundamental attack on mainstream Mauritanian identity. He was promptly arrested and charged with apostasy, which is a capital offense.

In this country, racism runs deep. The most prominent racial hierarchy runs from Beydane (Arabs and Imazighen, or “White Moors”) to Haratine (mixed-race former slaves) to Black Africans (Wolof, Soninke, and Peuhl). Both Haratine and Black Africans are routinely denied national identity cards. This amounts to rendering such individuals stateless, as they are deprived of the basic rights of citizenship, including state-sponsored education, the ability to gain employment in the formal work sector, and the right to vote.

Despite the Islamic tenet that no Muslim should enslave another Muslim, Mauritania has the highest incidence of slavery in the world and there is a deeply rooted culture of slave keeping that is perceived as religiously legitimate. Even within Black African communities, there are slave owners and slaves. Slaves are taught that the only route to eternal salvation is through unquestioning obedience to their masters. This belief is so strong that some slave mothers will beat their own children into submission, and disown those who might escape.

The Ould Mkhaitir affair encapsulates and illuminates the broader battle for Mauritania’s future—whether it might follow a path toward international standards for democracy and human rights, or an Islamist reform agenda, or whether the military elite will remain in control through a combination of overt police repression and adroit maneuvering. President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz pays lip service to human rights while simultaneously manipulating and condoning conservative religious views and caste-based racial hierarchies.

http://www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/17914/religion-race-and-repression-in-mauritania_the-oul

[okasha]

6. Thanks, rug.

That makes the situation a lot clearer.

[rug]

7. You're welcome.

Facts trump talking points.

[msongs]

3. more proof of the real value of religion nt

[mr blur]

4. But what does this have to do with religion?

Last edited Thu Dec 25, 2014, 07:10 PM - Edit history (1)

Apologists queue here:

(or doesn't it count if it 's not a true religion?

[trotsky]

8. It doesn't count when they say it doesn't count.

Duh.

[Cartoonist]

5. That's what the Bible says

a deeply rooted culture of slave keeping that is perceived as religiously legitimate.

[Iggo]

9. Idiots.