Govts told not to manipulate religion

Govts told not to manipulate religion

Fabiola Desy Unidjaja, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Women activists have criticized the state for intervening in
people's personal affairs using religion as a justification,
which they say has led to discrimination against woman in
countries where the majority of people are Muslims.

Ending their three-day international meeting in Jakarta on
Sunday, the activists urged Indonesia and other Muslim states to
take all legal, social and political measures to stop human
rights abuses against women, particularly in relation to their
sexual rights.

"In Muslim societies, sexuality, especially a woman's body, is
increasingly becoming an arena of intense political and social
conflict," said a statement issued during the final day of the
meeting.

The forum was attended by around 30 women activists from
countries including Egypt, Turkey, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Lebanon,
India, the Philippines, Malaysia and Indonesia. The discussion
focussed on sexuality and human rights in Muslim societies in
South and Southeast Asia.

The meeting highlighted that conservative political forces
were fiercely trying to reinforce the traditional mechanism of
control over women's sexuality in Muslim nations.

"Widespread practices of sexual violence, forced marriages,
female genital mutilation, marital rape, unsafe abortion and
discrimination based on sexual orientation constitute blatant
human rights violations," the statement said.

Citing an example, Indonesian activist Musdah Mulia said the
world's largest Muslim country enforces many discriminative laws
against women, using Islamic law as a reference.

"The most crucial problem in Indonesia is state intervention
by making a compilation of Islamic law a positive law through a
presidential decree in 1991," said Musdah, who is also the
Ministry of Religious Affairs director of religious research and
social affairs.

"Indonesia is not an Islamic state, but its interpretations of
Islamic law are much more conservative than Islamic states such
as Malaysia. We need to revise this compilation," she added.

The compilation of articles under Islamic law, discriminates
against women's rights as it allows polygamy for husbands and
forbids marriages of couples of different religions, as well as
prohibits women from serving as a witness in marriage, Musdah
said.

"Another example is the criminalization of adultery. It is a
sin, but the state should leave such a (personal) matter to a
person's conscience and should not intervene," Musdah added.

She said the conservative perception, wherein women are
considered second class believers in Islam, prevails in many
countries although it has been refuted by many.

Egyptian activist Amal Abd-el Hadi said that there was also a
trend in her country where Islamic law was interpreted in
accordance with the current political needs there.

"They use the hadits for political reasons. Some of it we
never heard of before," she said during a press briefing held
after the international meeting.

Hadits is the traditional collection of stories relating the
sayings and deeds of Prophet Muhammad, which also serves as the
explanation of the Koran.

Amal underlined that Islam teaches human dignity, although the
interpretation of Islamic instruction could range from very
progressive to strictly conservative.

"If we are willing to fight for human rights and gender
equality, we can also find verses in the Koran on that," she
said.

She and other participants of the meeting said every woman
should be fully informed about their sexual rights and that
strong advocacy for them from non-government organization was
necessary.