PLURALISM

The bestowal of one of the world's top accolades on a president less than nine months in office, who has yet to score a major foreign policy success, was greeted with gasps of astonishment from journalists at the announcement in Oslo. The Norwegian Nobel Committee praised Obama for 'his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.' Critics - some in parts of the Arab and Muslim world - called the committee decision premature. Obama's press secretary woke him with the news before dawn and the president felt 'humbled' by the award, a senior administration official said. When told in an email from Reuters that many people around the world were stunned by the announcement, Obama's senior adviser, David Axelrod, responded: 'As are we'. The first African-American to hold his country's highest office, Obama, 48, has called for disarmament and worked to restart stalled Middle East peace mov...

President Hamid Karzai's dismissal of Amrullah Saleh, the head of Afghanistan's National Directorate for Security (NDS) - the equivalent of MI5 - and Hanif Atmar, the head of the Interior Ministry, on Sunday exposed deep divisions within the Afghan government and Nato members over an emerging peace talks process. The move has been hailed as a boost for negotiations on reconciliation with insurgents by those in favour of the talks, including some British officials and Pakistan, but criticised by their American counterparts. Mr Saleh and Mr Atmar were sacked after the Taliban carried out a rocket attack on a gathering of tribal elders in Kabul last week during a speech by President Karzai. Although the rockets missed the building were the peace conference was being held, the breach was deemed a serious assault on the Afghan government. But Mr Saleh said the reasons for his dismissal went beyond the security failure, adding that he had worked to undermine efforts to...

South Africans are celebrating how far they have come since Nelson Mandela took his first steps to freedom 20 years ago today. Thousands gathered for commemorations at what was known in 1990 as Victor Verster Prison, near Cape Town. A re-enactment is planned of the moment Mandela, hand-in-hand with his then-wife Winnie, walked free after 27 years in prison. Cyril Ramaphosa, a leader in Mandela’s African National Congress, said: “We knew that his freedom meant that our freedom had also arrived.” Just four years after Mandela’s release, South Africans held their first all-race elections, making Mandela their first black president. His ANC has reduced poverty, built houses and delivered water, electricity and schools to blacks who had been without under apartheid. But needs remain great. Mvuso Mbali, 37, was in the crowd today and said he was at the prison 20 years ago. “I still remember vividly what happened,” he said. He added: “Today we are reinventing our freedom...

Most Islamic studies teachers in public and private schools in Java oppose pluralism, tending toward radicalism and conservatism, according to a survey released in Jakarta on Tuesday. The study shows 62.4 percent of the surveyed Islamic teachers, including those from Nahdlatul Ulama and Muhammadiyah — the country’s two largest Muslim organizations — reject the notion of having non-Muslim leaders. The survey was conducted last month by the Center for Islamic and Society Studies (PPIM) at Syarif Hidayatullah State Islamic University in Jakarta, involving some 500 Islamic studies teachers throughout Java. It reveals 68.6 percent of the respondents are opposed to non-Muslims becoming their school principle and 33.8 percent are opposed to having non-Muslim teachers at their schools. Some 73.1 percent of the teachers don’t want followers of other religions to build their houses of worship in their neighborhoods, it found. Some 85.6 percent of the teachers prohibit their s...

Everybody is bashing the Comelec for refusing to accredit the Ang Ladlad as a partylist group of gays and lesbians for the coming elections. They accuse the Comelec of deciding on the petition on the basis of morality, which is beyond its authority and competence to decide. That may be true, of course. But could the Comelec have acted otherwise? This country is not the kind of society some would like it to be. It was thus a very valid fear on the part of the Comelec that a far greater backlash would have swallowed it had it chosen to rule otherwise. Let us not be too harsh on the Comelec by saying it overstepped its bounds as electoral overseer because if there was only some way the poll body could have avoided deciding on the Ang Ladlad challenge, that would have been the way it would have taken. The Comelec did not relish the job of deciding on that petition. Unfortunately for the poll body, it was doomed from the first moment the Ang Ladlad set its sigh...

Do not feel we've stepped on the mid-year 2010. Lots of changes, and also a lot of innovations that have emerged, which of course is expected to be useful for everyone. In the year 2010 we are spoiled with all the existing facilities, which makes everything much easier and more comfortable for us. The increase is most we can see during the passage of time is, the increasing number of owners of vehicles, especially cars. Almost in every house we find a car parked in their garage. Of course, this indication of an increased standard of living citizens of the world. Today I will discuss the dependence of society on their vehicles, namely cars. Can not be denied again, that when this car became one basic requirement for most people, other than to facilitate all the activities, the car can also enhance their prestige in society, therefore, many people are willing to spend a lot of money to make the car they comfortable, and also reflects the owner. But too often th...