Religious Dissent and Criticism in Islamic Nations

Description: Complete video at: fora.tv Hudson Institute Senior Fellow Paul Marshall discusses harsh punishments faced by critics of Islam in many predominantly Muslim countries. ---- "The UN's Racism Conference, 'Islamophobia,' and the Campaign to Crush Debate and Dissent within Islam," featuring discussants Anne Bayefsky, Paul Marshall, Sheikh Ahmed Subhy Mansour and Fahad Nazer. Nina Shea moderates. Preparations are underway for the 2009 UN World Conference on Racism and, as a result of intense lobbying by the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC), the issue of "Islamophobia" will be a prominent focus. The World Conference could ensure that a prohibition against "Islamophobia" will be endorsed by the world community as the newest international human right. Hudson's conference explained the proposed bans against "Islamophobia," comparing them to blasphemy strictures that have been used to curtail freedoms of expression, press, and religion by some of the OIC's most repressive member states - Hudson Institute Paul Marshall is senior fellow at the Claremont Institute, and at the Center for Religious Freedom, Freedom House, Washington, DC He is a Senior Fellow at Hudson Institute and the author and editor of over twenty books on religion and politics, especially religious freedom. He has just completed a world survey on religious freedom, to be published this December, and is heading a research project on blasphemy and political repression.