Proposal to apply sharia to non-Muslims - Religion/Malaysia
5/4/08
Lawyers, minorities, but also women and religious Muslims in Malaysia are expressing their strong concerns about the proposal to apply sharia to non-Muslims as well, which has emerged in a recent seminar of Islamic scholars and jurists. The chorus of condemnation was unleashed by the declaration of a judge of the Islamic court of appeal, Mohamed Asri Abdullah, who said that during the meeting there were discussions about applying the penalties for the crime of khalwat (excessive closeness between two persons) to non-Muslims well as well, through civil tribunals. In fact, in Malaysia there exist two forms of law: Islamic and constitutional, and the two often are in conflict. One example is religious freedom, which is guaranteed by the constitution but violated by sharia, which punishes those who “abandon” Islam by converting.