=== Aum Shinrikyo
1. Law puts brakes on Aum activities
2. Tokyo court rejects AUM suit against Mainichi report

=== Falun Gong
3. Chinese police bar Falun Gong adherents in Macau

=== Zhong Gong
4. Chinese mystical leader detained in US launches hunger strike

=== Scientology
5. Bern: sect report presented

=== Islam
6. An international Muslim community is growing in West Michigan
7. Eastern Malaysia in a punitive state after theocrats take power
8. Moslem sects opposes compulsory dress code for women

=== Catholicism
9. Are the Madonna's tears of blood for real?

=== Jehovah's Witnesses
10. Top court backs Jehovah's Witnesses' appeal

» Part 2

=== Hate Groups
11. Former Klan leader Duke in Moscow to promote anti-Semitic book
12. Rally strengthens Skokie resolve
13. $25,000 bail set for alleged Klan chief
14. Group seeks to halt gift to neo-Nazi
15. Soldiers linked to neo-Nazism
16. Extremists can serve in forces: defence chief
17. Agency Urges Bertelsmann to Curb Nazis on Napster
18. Experts discuss threat of Internet antisemitism

=== Other News
19. Rod Ferrell is moved from death row
20. Rasta drug may be a human right, says judge
21. Two Rajneeshee members plead guilty
22. Wills' Chile leader is in 'brainwashing' sect
23. McMartin Case's Legal, Social Legacies Linger
24. The Victims Can't Be Counted (McMartin case)
25. Dutch to recognise gay weddings
26. Astrologers tell India to beware its neighbours


=== Aum Shinrikyo

1. Law puts brakes on Aum activities
Japan Times (Japan), Dec. 20, 2000
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Although a year-old law to regulate dangerous organizations has put the brakes on the activities of Aum Shinrikyo, the cult still poses a potential threat to the public, Justice Minister Masahiko Komura said Tuesday.

Since Jan. 28, the Public Security Investigation Agency has carried out 15 on-the-spot inspections, covering 39 Aum facilities nationwide, in accordance with the law that took effect on Dec. 27 last year.
(...)

He said that the potential danger of the cult still exists, however, as jailed guru Shoko Asahara continues to wield immense power.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


2. Tokyo court rejects AUM suit against Mainichi report
Kyodo (Japan), Dec. 18, 2000
http://home.kyodo.co.jp/fullstory/display.jsp?newsnb=20001218148
[Story no longer online? Read this]
TOKYO Dec. 18 Kyodo - The Tokyo District Court on Monday rejected a 10 million yen damages suit filed by the AUM Shinrikyo cult against the Mainichi Shimbun over a report on the cult's alleged ongoing research on the nerve gas sarin.

Presiding Judge Takahisa Fukuda said in the ruling that the report in the Mainichi's May 26 morning editions did not say AUM is researching the deadly gas as an organization.

''There are deep-rooted anxieties among the general public about the cult and it cannot be recognized that the report further undermines it,'' the judge said.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Falun Gong

3. Chinese police bar Falun Gong adherents in Macau
CNN/AP, Dec. 19, 2000
http://www.cnn.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
MACAU (AP) -- Police scuffled Tuesday with Falun Gong meditation sect followers in Macau and allegedly deported at least 30 who hoped to demonstrate Wednesday -- the first anniversary of Macau's return to Chinese sovereignty after centuries of Portuguese rule.

Ordinary citizens are pleased gangsters are no longer shooting up the streets of the tiny gambling enclave, as they were before the handover, but activists say freedoms guaranteed for the next 50 years may already be under threat.

Falun Gong adherents complained of police thwarting their efforts to protest outside anniversary ceremonies to be attended by Chinese President Jiang Zemin, whose government has staged a massive crackdown of Falun Gong on the mainland, where the group is outlawed.
(...)

In the late afternoon, authorities surrounded about a half dozen Falun Gong adherents outside the Lisboa, Macau's biggest casino, then dragged them away and shoved them into police cars.
(...)

Earlier, police detained three Falun Gong members who set out in a taxi to meet others arriving by ferry from Hong Kong. Two more Falun Gong members in Macau were pushed into the ferry departure hall, apparently to be shipped to Hong Kong, which is 40 miles (64 kilometers) to the east.

Most Falun Gong followers on the ferry were barred from entering.

Kan said 30 people had been deported and Falun Gong adherents complained of several arrests, but police had no immediate comment on any action against Falun Gong.

The Macau government and police said earlier they had declined a public assembly permit sought by Falun Gong because it would have disturbed traffic.

A Macau Falun Gong adherent, Lam Iat-meng, told reporters his family has been under 24-hour surveillance and police searched his home Monday night without a warrant, saying they were looking for illegal immigrants or drugs.

Several anti-Beijing activists were also turned away at the ferry terminal on Tuesday. Lui Yuk-lin said she had taken only three steps onto the pier before being detained and deported.
(...)

Like former British colony Hong Kong, Macau is supposed to enjoy considerable autonomy and freedom for at least 50 years under an arrangement dubbed ''one country, two systems,'' but the human rights center said the situation was looking more like ''one country, one system.''

Despite such worries, many ordinary Macau people are pleased to have returned to China, following the departure of the highly unpopular Portuguese administration. The people here are predominantly Chinese who finally find themselves speaking the same language as the officials who govern them.

Macau's infamous Chinese triad gangs had waged a vicious turf war in the last years of Portuguese rule, but there has been just one assassination since the handover, compared to 37 a year earlier.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Zhong Gong

4. Chinese mystical leader detained in US launches hunger strike
AFP, Dec. 19, 2000
http://sg.dailynews.yahoo.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
The leader of China's mystical Zhonggong group said Monday he had launched a hunger strike, claiming he was facing inhumane jail conditions while pressing his appeal for asylum in the United States.

Zhang Hongbao, 46, was granted the right to remain in the United States in September, but his asylum request is still pending and he remains in detention in Guam.

China has vigorously opposed his application, branding him a criminal and has accused him of raping several followers and demanded his deportation.

Zhang said in a statement received here that he had started to refuse food on December 14 and claimed his action had already led to an improvement in his conditions.

''The ultimate goal of this hunger strike is to demand my freedom according to the decision by the immigration court in Hawaii,'' he wrote in a letter released through dissident organisations.

''I hope my overdue release be realized before the end of the Clinton administration,'' he said, adding that only by giving him freedom could officials prove that US justice was impartial and free of political influence.

The US Justice Department refused to comment on individual cases, but said that Zhang had been granted protection by virtue of a law which grants refuge to people deemed likely to face torture in their homelands.

A department official said allegations against Zhang were being carefully studied, before a decision could be made on the asylum request.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Scientology

5. Bern: sect report presented
Neue Luzerne Zeitung (Switzerland), Dec. 16, 2000
Translation: CISAR
http://cisar.org/001216a.htm
[Story no longer online? Read this]
The often extremely obtrusive behavior of Scientology members has led alternately to tension and to forceful reaction. The status report of the Federal Office of Police (BAP) acknowledged that in the status report published yesterday. But because no intelligence operations or attempts to infiltrate government positions have been ascertained, the federal government will not take any active measures. The BAP came to the same conclusion in their first status report in 1998. The situation will be re-evaluated as dictated by developments.

Sect experts can accept these conclusions, but point out that the sect scene has drastically changed. The dangerous self-dynamic of these groups, which can be extremely risky for members, is a source of concern for renowned sect expert Georg Otto Schmid. Yet the federal assembly does not want to get involved with its own sect politic and neither is it ready to give counseling centers a helping hand in the matter of financial support.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Islam

6. An international Muslim community is growing in West Michigan
The Grand Rapids Press, Dec. 17, 2000
http://gr.mlive.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
(...) Fueled by an influx of Bosnian and African refugees, the local Muslim community has grown from roughly 2,000 to more than 10,000 over the past five years, according to estimates by officials from the Islamic Center and a resettlement agency.

Along with American converts and a mix of Arabs, Pakistanis and other immigrants, the refugees are part of a community that needs more room to worship, educate its youth and marry and bury its members.

Leaders recently met with Grand Rapids Mayor John Logie to ask for his help in locating potential properties and cemetery space set aside for Muslims. Logie says he will do what he can.

Leaders are looking at a former Orthodox church as a possible site for a new mosque. They also may consider Grand Rapids schools slated to be closed.

Muslims have raised close to $100,000 for a new building, mostly from a couple of dozen generous donors. But their quest for better facilities is hindered by Islam's prohibition against borrowing and paying interest -- and by the limited financial means of most refugees.

''It's unfair for anybody to tell these people, 'Can you afford to pay me $20 a month?' '' said Ali Metwalli, president of the Islamic Center. ''That $20 a month will give them food for the family for a few days.''

Local Muslims share their space problems with others across the country. With roughly 6 million adherents, Islam is considered one of America's fastest-growing religions.

''Mosques around the country are bursting at the seams,'' said Ibrahim Hooper, spokesman for the Washington, D.C.-based Council on American-Islamic Relations.

That's certainly the case in Michigan. The state is believed to have the nation's second-highest Muslim population after California, with 500,000 to 700,000 adherents, said Muthanna Hanooti of the council's Michigan office.

With a huge concentration in Dearborn, Muslims operate about 30 major mosques in metro Detroit and are building four multimillion-dollar facilities, Hanooti said. Lansing, Ann Arbor and Flint also have growing communities, he said.

Locally, Islam's steady growth accelerated in the mid-1990s with the sudden influx of refugees from the civil war in Bosnia. Grand Rapids is home to more than 10,000 Bosnians, about 80 percent of whom are Muslim, said Carol Russo, a case worker with the Catholic Human Development Outreach agency.

In recent years, the community's numbers have been further swollen by refugees from strife-torn African countries including Somalia, Sierra Leone and Sudan.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


7. Eastern Malaysia in a punitive state after theocrats take power
Associated Press, Dec. 18, 2000
http://www.chicagotribune.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
KUALA TERENGGANU, Malaysia -- The owner of the Scissors Comb salon expects to be out of business soon. Women and men may not cut each other's hair, the local Muslim authorities have decreed.

''All my workers are females, and 80 percent of customers are men. I might as well close shop,'' said Lim Eng Keong.

Like the owners of pubs, movie theaters, pool halls and betting shops, Lim is tasting the bitter aftermath of a voter uprising a year ago that threw out Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad's party and elected a puritan Muslim government in eastern Malaysia.

Not only are the 1 million people in Kuala Terengganu being squeezed by Islamic restrictions, they are also being punished by Mahathir's government, which has cut off the state's earnings from offshore oil, the foundation of its prosperity.

Until November last year, the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party, or PAS, controlled only one Malaysian province. The others were mostly run by Mahathir's United Malay National Organization, which governs Malaysia as a multi-ethnic, multi-religious society where Islam is pre-eminent but religious militancy is firmly discouraged.

In 1998, the iron-fisted Mahathir stirred sweeping discontent by jailing his popular deputy, Anwar Ibrahim, and in elections the following year he paid a price. Although his coalition retained two-thirds of the 193 seats in parliament, the Islamic party tripled its strength and captured its second state government, Terengganu.

Since then, Mahathir has tried to crush the opposition party by threatening its leaders with prosecution, shutting down its publications and choking off oil royalties.

In Terengganu, , men and women line up separately at supermarket registers. Muslim women have to wear headscarves. Muslims are banned from working in the few restaurants that are still allowed to sell liquor. Those jobs can be held only by people of Terengganu's 5-percent Buddhist and Christian minority.

Chief Minister Abdul Hadi Awang, who heads the state government, is also an Islamic preacher. He holds weekly classes to make sure government employees keep the faith.

The burden is heaviest on services, tourism and entertainment, largely run by non-Muslims such as hair stylist Lim, an ethnic Chinese, and Gopi Chand, an ethnic Indian grocer.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


8. Moslem sects opposes compulsory dress code for women
The Guardian (Nigeria), Dec. 18, 2000
http://www.ngrguardiannews.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Member[s] of the Qadiriyya and Tijjaniyya sects of Islam in Kano during the weekend, condemned in totality any attempt to impose ''Hijab'' on all Moslems women in the state, (Hijab, a kind of Islamic women outfit which laws from head to toes), following the adoption of Sharia laws in the state.

The sects led by two leading Islamic scholars in the state, Sheilah Karibullah Nasiru Kbara of Kadiriyya movement and Sheikh lamcald Khalife explained that 'Hijab' should not be made compulsory because it contradicted the type mentioned in the Holy Koran.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Catholicism

9. Are the Madonna's tears of blood for real?
Daily Mail & Guardian (South Africa), Dec. 19, 2000
http://www.mg.co.za/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
When villagers at Civitavecchia witnessed tears of blood falling down the face of a souvenir Madonna, they proclaimed it a miracle. But soon, experts were branding it a cunning hoax and a row ensued

What strikes people most when they first see the weeping Madonna of Civitavecchia is her size. The white glazed plaster statue is only 40cm high, her face, with its downcast eyes, no bigger than a man's thumb.

For five years La Madonnina, the little madonna, as she is known locally, has stood behind bullet-proof glass in the little church of St Agostino in Pantano, a poor agricultural suburb of the port of Civitavecchia, near Rome. Every year she attracts thousands of pilgrims. Of the scores of ''miracles'' reported in Italy during the lead-up to the millennium, only this ''weeping Madonna'', who even has her own website, continues to bring in the charabancs, transforming a once-unknown chapel off a dirt-track into an international religious shrine.

However, anyone hoping to see her weep, or detect traces of blood on her cheeks, will be disappointed. Since allegedly weeping tears of blood in front of thousands of witnesses in February 1995, La Madonnina has remained dry- eyed and all traces of blood have long since faded. Which is more than can be said for the controversy that surrounds her.

La Madonnina's worldwide renown is due as much to her supposed mystical powers as to the fact that, for five years, she has been the subject of an unprecedented and bizarre criminal investigation in which the Italian authorities have become embroiled in a so-called ''pious fraud'', a charge normally ignored, or dealt with by the Church. In this case, the procura, or district attorney, is determined to expose La Madonnina's tears as a hoax and identify the culprits as the statue's owner, Fabio Gregori, and his family.

The inquiry appears set to run indefinitely and has all the makings of an absurdist melodrama, involving the diverging interests of anti-cult campaigners, judicial authorities, the Catholic Church and the mayor of Civitavecchia, Pietro Tidei, a communist non-believer who is determined that the shrine at Pantano should become as commercially viable as Lourdes, Fatima or Medjugorje.
(...)

Even in Italy, with nine separate lacrimazioni (weepings) reported in the first two months of 1995 alone, belief had begun to give way to scepticism as each incident was either dismissed due to unreliable eyewitness reports or found to be a practical joke or some natural phenomenon, such as dewdrops forming on a statue.

Why should La Madonnina of Civitavecchia be any different? The answer lies in the web of intrigue that still surrounds the case and speculation over one of the most colourful characters involved in it, Monsignor Girolamo Grillo, the bishop of Civitavecchia.
(...)

The entire saga, says Forestieri, has had a ''tragic impact on Gregori's life, making him mistrustful and withdrawn''.

His refusal to submit to a DNA test is still regarded by many as suspicious, but Forestieri remains dubious about standards of the original forensic analysis, in which only five strands of DNA were identified from blood on the statue, instead of the dozen or more required for accurate matching. What especially grieves Gregori - who declined Forestieri's request to speak to me - is that a profoundly mystical event has become not only a money-grabbing enterprise but is also fodder for pop-science TV shows.

One can see his point. In February this year, after a service celebrating the fifth anniversary of the original ''weeping'', Alfredo Barrago, a popular magician, shone a red laser beam on to the statue from a gallery in the church as part of a TV demonstration on how to conjure tears of blood.

In recent years such exposés of the paranormal have become increasingly popular. Among the more bizarre explanations for La Madonnina's tears is the suggestion that someone fitted the statue with special contact lenses, which expand and release liquid when exposed to heat, or that a blood-filled syringe fitted inside the figurine was attached to a hidden battery, allowing the device to be electronically activated by remote control. The suggestion that Gregori may have resorted to such tricks has, says Forestieri, reduced his client to an emotional wreck.

Panunzio of the anti-charlatan hotline, who has conducted his own research into phoney miracles, is convinced that Gregori was set up: ''Almost certainly he and Bishop Grillo were cheated by unscrupulous people who want to increase superstition and decrease faith. Exploitation of holy icons is widespread among occultists.''
(...)

Even if the truth behind La Madonnina is never revealed, the case, by setting a precedent for police involvement in Church affairs, raises important questions over the whole issue of ''pious fraud'' and the rigour with which such apparent misdemeanours are investigated. In their persistent hounding of Gregori when so many other people might have played a part in the incident, the authorities in Civitavecchia have displayed an astonishing lack of common sense. Why else enlist the help of illusionists whose prime instinct is to entertain?

Theories, such as those propounded by Barrago, seem to have convinced prosecutors that the ''weeping'' was the result of some absurdly elaborate mechanism, when in fact there is likely to be a far simpler, if mundane explanation.

Until Grillo's astonishing volte-face, priests were often the first, and best qualified, to debunk reported ''miracles'', if only to reassure those who might reject a Church that embraces superstition. Their lack of scientific expertise has even led some priests to call on help from the unlikeliest sources, such as the Italian Committee for Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal (Cicap).

Although best known for investigations into psychic healing and extra-sensory perception, one of Cicap's founder members, Luigi Garlaschelli, is increasingly focusing his attention on pious frauds, sometimes at the request of the clergy. Although he has not been asked to investigate the weeping Madonna of Civitavecchia, he has followed events closely and taken part in TV debates on the case.

Garlaschelli is Italy's foremost investigator of ''miracles'' involving tears and blood. He invites me to his laboratory on a scorching Saturday afternoon to demonstrate how statues can be made to weep and bleed. He brings out a selection of male and female plaster busts, their faces streaked and eyes rimmed bright red.

One is a kitsch replica of the head of Michelangelo's David, the top neatly sawn off. Garlaschelli takes the detached section, and pops it on and off like the lid of a teapot, the join hidden by the curls of hair: inside are two thin plastic tubes connected to a hollow central chamber and glued at the other end behind each of the eyes. Other busts have one or more tiny holes drilled into their scalps and are hollow inside or contain a small cavity behind the eyes.

The mechanisms all work on a similar principle. ''The statue must be of thin, porous plaster or ceramic and glazed all over outside, allowing the material to absorb fluid without anything seeping out,'' says Garlaschelli. ''You fill the statue or inner reservoir with water, plain or dyed red. Make tiny, almost invisible pinpricks or scratches in the glaze on the corners of the lower eyelid; the fluid eventually trickles or flows through and there you have your tears.''
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Jehovah's Witnesses

10. Top court backs Jehovah's Witnesses' appeal
CNN/Reuters, Dec. 19, 2000
http://www.cnn.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
KARLSRUHE, Germany (Reuters) -- Germany's highest court on Tuesday overturned a previous ruling denying official status to the Jehovah's Witnesses and ordered a new study of their bid to be a recognised religious body.

The Federal Constitutional Court quashed a 1997 ruling that the Christian sect, founded in the U.S., should be refused the status of a public body because it forbade its members from taking part in political elections.

''A religious group should be judged not by its beliefs but by its behaviour,'' said Judge Winfried Hassemer, explaining his ruling.

Under German law, churches granted public body status can levy centrally collected taxes from their members, are themselves exempt from most forms of taxation and have the right to representation on state radio and television management panels.
(...)

''We walked out of the courtroom happy with this ruling,'' said Gajus Glockentin, the Witnesses' legal representative.

''We are confident we shall get a different ruling now from the Federal Administrative Court,'' he added.

The Administrative Court earlier turned down the group's request for public body status and must now reassess the case.

The 1997 ruling had said the group's ban on participation in elections was a sign of ''insufficient loyalty'' to the German state. In its appeal, the church argued that loyalty to the state was not a precondition for that status.

The Constitutional Court said the church's application for such status should be reassessed using the criterion of whether its members were able freely to enjoy the rights guaranteed them under the German constitution.
(...)

German restrictions on the California-based Church of Scientology -- whose members are barred from government jobs in some regions -- have been criticised by U.S. celebrities and business leaders who are members of the church.

German authorities say that Scientology masquerades as a religion but exploits its members to raise money.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]

* Theologically, Jehovah's Witnesses is a cult of Christianity. Evaluated sociologically, it has many cultic elements as well.

Scientology is not a religion, but rather a commercial enterprise masquerading as a religion.

» Part 2