Entries Tagged 'News' ↓

This all sounds a bit far fetched, right? 2,000 Islamic schools?

But this is exactly what the government has been doing in Indonesia; building and opening Islamic schools with a target of 2,000 such schools being established by 2009.  It’s all part of the War against Terror.

Antara reports on the first 46 that have been opened recently:

The Australian Ambassador to Indonesia, Bill Farmer, and Indonesian Minister for Religious Affairs Muhammad M Basyuni here on Wednesday attended a ceremony at MTs PSA Al Fauzan in Labruk Lor, Lumajang District, East Java Province, to mark the opening of 46 Islamic junior secondary schools (Madrasah Tsanawiyah) that have been built with Australian assistance.

The construction of the 46 schools commenced in 2006 and are ready for the 2007 school year, which began last month. Work is due to commence in coming weeks on further 275 Islamic schools that will open to students in mid 2008.

Farmer said the schools were part of the Rp2.5 trillion Australian Government program which is funding the construction or expansion of 2000 schools in 20 Indonesian provinces until 2009.

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Dr Haneef, the Indian doctor accused of terrorism offenses and subsequently released after the DPP dropped all charges, has had his visa reinstated. You can read the judgement here.

Update: The government is appealing.

The Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) has just announced that the terror charge against Dr Haneef has been dropped. This follows a review by DPP head Damian Bugg.

They will be holding a press conference in Canberra at 3:30pm. More to follow.

Update: The DPP says they made a mistake.

Update 2: Video of DPP press conference here and video of immigration minister conference here.

Update 3: India is asking the Australian government to reissue his visa. The Age has a lot more information including a photo of Dr Haneef leaving the prison. Premier Peter Beattie has said Haneef is welcome to return to work at the hospital if the government reinstates his visa.

Update 4: The government says Haneef is free to leave but they will not be reinstating his visa.

Yesterday, there were reports quoting anonymous sources that Dr Haneef had allegedly been planning a local terrorist attack. These were subsequently dismissed as false by the head of the Australian Federal Police.

Today, we read in The Australian that the Australian Federal Police had written the names of overseas terror suspects in Dr Haneef’s diary and then proceeded to challenge him about the entries in his police interview.

A NEW bungle has emerged in the investigation of Mohamed Haneef as Australian Federal Police chief Mick Keelty yesterday dimissed reports that the Indian doctor was suspected of being involved in a plot to attack the Gold Coast’s tallest building.

The Australian can reveal that investigating AFP officers wrote the names of overseas terror suspects in Dr Haneef’s personal diary, only to later grill him during an interrogation over whether he had written the potentially incriminating notes.

What is going on here?

The treatment of Dr Haneef has been deeply troubling for many Australians, of all political stripes. I don’t know if Haneef is guilty as charged (or guilty of more) but I hope he is, because if he is innocent then we have witnessed a high-tech public lynching.

What has equally surprised me has been the near universal silence of the plethora of Muslim organisations and their self-appointed leaders. Australian readers will recall that usually you cannot get these guys to shut up, they are willing to give an Islamic opinion on the opening of a tap. Some have offered “one on one” counselling to Australian models caught using drugs, others will show up to the opening of an envelope. They are the scourge of the public space.

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AMCRAN’s Dr Waleed Kadous spoke to ABC Radio today about the implications that the government’s handling of the Haneef case may have on relations between the Muslim community and the authorities. He also talks about the anxiety that the case is causing within the community:

It’s every Muslim’s fear that this could happen to him.

They can imagine being in the same situation Dr Haneef was in, that, you know, they left a SIM card with a relative before leaving the country and then something happens a year later. They can imagine borrowing money from someone and paying the loan back. These are not unusual things.

And to see him treated in this way, and when Muslims read the record of interview that’s been released… I mean, as a Muslim myself, I read that and thought, you know, “There but for the grace of God go I”.

Peter Faris, QC was among the first to criticise the handling of the Haneef case:

Criminal barrister Peter Faris, QC, also accused Australian Federal Police of being “way out of their depth” after it emerged the Gold Coast doctor’s mobile phone SIM card was not found in the burnt-out Jeep at Glasgow airport after the botched terror attack, as a Brisbane court was told a week ago.

Instead the SIM card was discovered eight hours later in Liverpool with his second cousin Sabeel Ahmed, who is facing the minor charge of withholding information.

The Age reports today that the apparently bungled investigation is now something of a joke among British investigators:

In Britain, a source close to the investigation confirmed the SIM card was found in Liverpool, and said the Australian police were considered a laughing stock by Britain’s Metropolitan Police for allowing “such a major cock-up” to happen. “Australian police have got their wires crossed. This is very embarrassing for them. The police here are laughing at the Australian police, saying, ‘What on earth have they done?’ [Haneef] is clearly more of a political case than a police case.”

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The Australian is leading today with reports of some apparent flaws and contradictions between claims made in Dr Haneef’s record of interview and in court affidavits.

AUSTRALIAN Federal Police investigating terror suspect Mohamed Haneef made claims in a court affidavit that appear to be inconsistent with an official police record of interview.

Analysis by The Australian yesterday of the police affidavit, which is before the courts, and the 142-page record of Dr Haneef’s first police interview, show there are major discrepancies on two significant issues.

There are other concerning aspects to the case that have appeared in the press recently.

Firstly, it seems, Sabeel Ahmed, the ‘terrorist’ he allegedly recklessly provided support to, has been charged with withholding information from the British authorities because he received an email from his brother advising him of the location of his will. Of course, the contents of the email have not yet been made public but, if this is really all there is to it, then it is cause for some concern and it means that Dr Haneef may be even further removed from the terrorism attacks than we might have first assumed.

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Further to Dr Haneef’s leaked record of interview, comes a leaked set of government documents [pdf] detailing the reasons behind the cancellation of his visa.

As for who is leaking all this material? It’s Haneef’s barrister.

“Defence counsels don’t normally release the records of interview of their clients in the media,” he said.

“The reason why this is not normally done is because defence councils don’t normally have a document that indicates so clearly the very thin case that police are claiming to have, in which to say anything that my client has done was done in anything other than an innocent matter.

“That’s why the document has been released.”

Update: The Australian has a blog post up about the leaked documents:

This leak is damaging to the official line about Dr Haneef. This is probably why Keelty, Prime Minister John Howard and Attorney-General Philip Ruddock are angrily and loudly squawking about it.

The material in the record of interview sheds illuminating light on the case against detained Dr Mohamed Haneef.

I’m keeping an open mind about whether he’s involved in a terrorist organisation, but I reckon the public has a right to every snippet of information about this case.

Update 2: The barrister who leaked the material may now be charged, but he says he has no regrets. He explained to the ABC’s Lateline why he did it (see link for video).

Update 3: The Age reports, “A Federal Court judge has described as “astounding” the Federal Government’s position that an association of any kind with criminals — “a cup of coffee, a picnic with the kids” — is enough to fail the immigration character test.”

Update 4: The President of the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils has sent a letter to the Minister of Immigration in response to the cancellation of Dr Haneef’s visa.

Via Catallaxy comes this report on a plan to rescue Iraqi scholars and academics and place them temporarily in neighbouring countries:

In an urgent effort to save a critical mass of scholars unlike any initiative undertaken since World War II, the Institute of International Education’s Scholar Rescue Fund is finalizing plans to rescue hundreds of Iraqi professors beginning in the coming months.

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