Hydrablog

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/29/world/africa/29sudan.html
November 29, 2007
Briton Charged With Insulting Islam in Sudan
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN [sudan] [norther Africa; horn] [promiximity to Saudi peninsula] [recal OBL originally used Sudanese hospitality to set up what eventually became al Qaeda] [beyond the schism between West and Sudan over Darfur] [differences between Western liberalism and Sharia] [free speech] [********]
NAIROBI, Kenya, Nov. 28 — The Sudanese government decided on Wednesday to charge a British primary school teacher with blasphemy, inciting hatred and insulting Islam after she allowed her 7-year-old students to name a class teddy bear Muhammad.
If found guilty, the teacher, Gillian Gibbons, who taught at one of Sudan’s most exclusive private schools, could be sentenced to 6 months in jail and 40 lashes.
“She will be brought in front of a judge and now she must prove her innocence,” said Rabie A. Atti, a Sudanese government spokesman.
The British government responded by summoning the Sudanese ambassador to its foreign office in London.
“We are surprised and disappointed by the developments,” said Omar Daair, spokesman for the British embassy in Khartoum, Sudan’s capital. “This isn’t the way we were hoping it would go.”
The charges come at a time when Sudanese government officials continue to resist efforts to deploy peacekeepers in Darfur and have accused several Western countries of being anti-Islamic. On Tuesday, the British ambassador to the United Nations asked the Security Council to address the issue of outstanding warrants against a Sudanese government official and a militia leader accused of war crimes in Darfur, a troubled region of western Sudan where more than 200,000 people have died. Some Sudanese political analysts wonder if charges were filed against the British teacher in retaliation.
The teddy bear ordeal started in September when Ms. Gibbons, who is from Liverpool, began a project on animals and asked her class of 7-year-olds to come up with a name for a teddy bear. Unity School, where she taught — which the government shut down this week because of the controversy — educates a mix of Christian and Muslim students, many the children of wealthy Sudanese families and foreign diplomats. The class voted resoundingly to name the bear Muhammad, one of the most common names in the Muslim world and the name of Islam’s holy prophet.
Ms. Gibbons then asked students to bring the bear home, take pictures of it and write a diary about it. The entries were bound into a book called “My name is Muhammad.”
Several parents complained, according to the Sudanese government, and Ms. Gibbons, 54, was arrested on Sunday. [***]
“We don’t name animals Muhammad,” Dr. Rabie said.
In Islam, insulting the Prophet Muhammad is considered a grave offense, [****] and the law of northern Sudan, where Khartoum lies, makes this a crime.
Unity School printed an apology on Tuesday in several major newspapers in Khartoum, saying the school did not mean to offend Muslims and that Ms. Gibbons had acted without informing the school and had been fired.
Dr. Rabie said the case will come down to whether or not Ms. Gibbons intended to insult Islam.
“Maybe she has no intention, maybe she is mistaken, maybe she didn’t imagine that such a decision would create so much trouble,” he said. “This is what the judge will hear. Justice will take its course.”
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company