GENEVA, Nov 21 — Four years after cartoons of Prophet Muhammad set off violent protests across the Muslim world, Islamic nations are mounting a campaign for an international treaty to protect religious symbols and beliefs from mockery — essentially a ban on blasphemy that would put them on a collision course with free speech laws in the West.
Algeria and Pakistan are believed to be taking the lead in lobbying to eventually bring the proposal to a vote in the United Nations General Assembly.
If ratified in countries that enshrine freedom of expression as a fundamental right, such a treaty would require them to limit free speech if it risks seriously offending religious believers. The process, though, will take years and no showdown is imminent.
The proposal faces stiff resistance from Western countries, including the United States, which has declared it will not accept international treaties that restrict its Constitution’s First Amendment, which is the right to free speech.
Experts say the bid stands some chance of eventual success if Muslim countries persist. And whatever the outcome, the campaign risks reigniting tensions between Muslims and the West that US President Barack Obama has pledged to heal.
Four years ago, a Danish newspaper published cartoons lampooning Prophet Muhammad, prompting angry mobs to attack Western embassies in Muslim countries, including Lebanon, Iran and Indonesia. In a counter-movement, several European newspapers reprinted the images.
The countries that form the 56-member Organisation of the Islamic Conference are now lobbying a little-known Geneva-based UN committee to agree that a treaty protecting religions is necessary.
The move would be a first step towards drafting an international protocol that would eventually be put before the General Assembly — a process that could take a decade or more.
If the treaty was approved, any of the UN’s 192 member states that ratified it would be bound by its provisions. Others could face criticism for refusing to join.
From a legal point of view, “the whole exercise is dangerous from A to Z because it’s a departure from the practice and concept of human rights”, said Lukas Machon, who represents the International Commission of Jurists at the UN. It adds only restrictions.”
In a letter obtained by the Associated Press, Pakistan said insults against religion were on the increase.
The Islamic Conference “believes that the attack on sacredly held beliefs and the defamation of religions, religious symbols, personalities and dogmas impinge on the enjoyment of human rights of followers of those religions,” the letter said. It was sent last month to members of the Ad Hoc Committee on Complementary Standards, a temporary committee set up to consider a previous anti-racism treaty.
In a telephone interview on Wednesday, the committee’s chairman, Algerian Ambassador Idriss Jazairy, said concerns the treaty could stifle free speech have been “whipped up into a bugaboo”.
Failure to agree on a treaty would boost extremists in the Arab world, said Jazairy, a former envoy to the US.
“If we keep hitting this glass wall and say there’s nothing you can do about Islamophobia — you can do something about anti-Semitism but Islamophobia is out of bounds — you give an ideal platform for the recruitment of suicide bombers,” he said. — Straits Times
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(I hope people realise I'm kidding! I don't ever want to see something like this enter international law! Or Malaysian law for that matter...)