[vinnomot] Fwd: TASLIMA NASRIN LATE NEWS

Wasm  wrote:

Date: Sat, 24 Nov 2007 16:26:36 -0500
Subject: TASLIMA NASRIN LATE NEWS
From: To: SELECTED



The present e-mail is being sent collectively to the dozens who have e-mailed their support for and solidarity with Taslima Nasrin.  Thanks.  Your several hundred e-mails have been forwarded to Taslima, who has her laptop with her but likely cannot respond to all.

For the latest news about her reluctantly leaving Kolkata for Jaipur and then on to Delhi, a site with numerous other links, see

        http://news.google.com/news?client=safari&rls=en-us&q=taslima+nasrin&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&um=1&sa=N&tab=wn

In Delhi, Andrew Buncombe wrote (24 November 2007) of India's problems in respect to the Muslim extremists:

        http://news.independent.co.uk/world/asia/article3191525.ece

Today (24 November 2007), The New York Times published the following article:

Muslim Extremists Threaten a Writer

Taslima Nasreen has been the target of death threats from extremist Muslims since 1994, when she published "Shame," a novel that depicts violence against minority Hindus by Muslim fundamentalists in her native Bangladesh. Agence France-Presse reported that last week Ms. Nasreen, right, a self-proclaimed feminist and atheist, was being moved repeatedly, disguised in a black burqa, as authorities in India sought to assure her safety following violent Islamist protests calling for her expulsion from the country. "I am mentally distressed; I am not well at all," Ms. Nasreen told the Press Trust of India on Friday by telephone from an undisclosed location. She has lived in the Indian state of West Bengal since 2004, in an apartment guarded by Indian security forces, while seeking permanent residence in India, which is officially a secular country. So far, however, the government, fearful of upsetting the country's large Muslim minority, has granted her only six-month visa extensions. The All India Milli Council, a Muslim group, said in New Delhi on Friday that all Muslim organizations would "vehemently protest" her continued stay. In March, an offshoot group of the influential All India Muslim Personal Law Board declared a reward for anyone who "beheaded ... the notorious woman" who has "has put Muslims to shame." In August, Ms. Nasreen was assaulted in the Indian city of Hyderabad by Muslim activists, led by three state legislators, who hurled copies of her latest book at her and shouted for her death.

Whether or not India is a liberal and democratic country with a pluralist culture is at stake.  In October, Taslima told a French group – the Women's Alliance for Democracy – that if she is expelled from India, "I will never be able to live on the Indian subcontinent."


For Taslima:

Warren Allen Smith
New York City

---

Never miss a thing. Make Yahoo your homepage. __._,_.___

Your email settings: Individual Email|Traditional
Change settings via the Web (Yahoo! ID required)
Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest | Switch to Fully Featured
Visit Your Group | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use | Unsubscribe

__,_._,___