In an important ruling, an Egyptian court has allowed two converts to Islam to return to their original Coptic Orthodox faith. In the past many Copts who become Muslims in order to secure divorces (which is not permissible under Coptic practice) were allowed to reconvert to Christianity. However, a hardening of religious feeling in Egypt has made such delicate issues as conversion away from Islam much trickier. The ruling provides human rights and minority rights campaigners with hope that minority religious rights will be upheld and protected in Egypt.

Protesters took to the streets of the Kashmiri capital Srinagar [Feb. 11] to mark the 24th anniversary of the hanging of Maqbool Bhat, the founder of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front. In 1984, Bhat was executed in Delhi for killing an Indian intelligence officer. Indian police detained dozens of demonstrators in clashes that involved rock-throwing and tear gas. [Protesters demanded the return of Maqbool Bhat's remains, which are believed to be interred in an Indian prison.]

A car bomber killed ten people, including a candidate in upcoming [local] elections, in northwest Pakistan when he slammed his vehicle into the candidate's convoy [Feb. 11]. Nisar Ali Khan was due to run as an independent, but was thought to have close links to the Awami National Party, a secular leftist Pashtun nationalist party. The attack was the third against the ANP and its allies in less than a week. The Frontier Post, a daily newspaper published in the Pashtun border regions, condemns the attack on an ANP election rally in Charsadda, which left 27 dead on Sunday. The paper sees the blast as part of a "deeper conspiracy to divide up the Pashtuns and set them at one another's throats."

UN armored vehicles patrol East Timor's capital Dili under a state of emergency following an attack that critically wounded the President José Ramos-Horta Feb. 11. Ramos-Horta, who shared the 1996 Nobel Peace Prize (with Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo), was shot in the chest and stomach on the road in front of his house in an apparent coup attempt. His guards returned fire, killing wanted rebel leader Alfredo Reinado. Ramos-Horta was airlifted to an Australian hospital where surgeons said he was "extremely lucky to be alive" after they operated for three hours to remove bullet fragments and repair chest wounds. Gunmen also attacked Prime Minister Xanana Gusmao's motorcade an hour later, but he escaped unhurt.

From the Students Freedom Campaign, Tehran, Jan. 27:

February 16th, 2007:
International Day of Protest against Islamic Republic of Iran
For Freedom of All Imprisoned Students!

Incarceration, torture, pressure, arrest, and prosecution of egalitarian, freedom-loving students (in Iran) is continuing. While more than forty of egalitarian, freedom-loving students are still in jails, yet another group of ten students that had gathered in Tehran to discuss their next moves to free their comrades, have been arrested and sent to Evin prison by the security forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran. In cities of Mash'had, Sanandaj, Marivaun, Ghazvin, and Isfahaun students were attacked in their houses, arrested and sent to jails.

Spanish police Feb. 11 arrested 14 prominent members of the outlawed Basque nationalist party Batasuna. Most of the arrests, ordered by leading anti-terrorist prosecutor Judge Baltasar Garzon, took place in towns around the northern Basque region and neighboring Navarra. One, Nuria Alzugarai, was arrested in the southern city of Cordoba, where she was visiting a prisoner. Police searched the houses of Karmelo Landa and Mikel Etxaburu, arrested in Bilbao, and seized several computers. police also searched several houses in other Basque towns, including Elorrio. The detainees, who have been transferred to Madrid, are accused of "collaboration with a terrorist group." (EiTB, Feb. 11)

An estimated 3,500 people attended a rally on Feb. 6 in Danbury, Connecticut, to protest a partnership between Danbury police and US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). While the demonstrators voiced their opposition outside City Hall, inside the Common Council voted 19-2 to invite ICE to train and deputize Danbury police as immigration agents. Mayor Mark Boughton, who backs the plan, said it will start with the training of two detectives to carry out investigations of immigrants suspected of human trafficking, drug smuggling or document fraud. (News-Times, Danbury, Feb. 7; Hartford Courant, Feb. 7)

At a press conference on Jan. 28 at the Adalberto United Methodist Church in Chicago's Humboldt Park neighborhood, activist Flor Crisóstomo announced she would not comply with her deportation set for that date, and would instead go into sanctuary at the church. "I'm not going. I've asked my pastor and my church for sanctuary and they have granted it." US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said in a statement that Crisóstomo had been granted "voluntary departure" by an immigration judge, requiring her to leave the US no later than Jan. 28. Crisóstomo said she is not "defying the laws of this country and I'm not hiding. I am taking the position of civil disobedience to press this government to act, to fix the broken laws and end this inhumane system of cheap undocumented labor and exploitation." Church pastor Walter Coleman noted that "the forces that bring people here are still there. The Free Trade Treaty has destroyed agriculture in Mexico and other countries and until it is renegotiated people will keep coming." (Diario Hoy, Jan. 29)