Headline News 22/07/2022

Headlines:

• Islamophobia: Muslims Describe Abuse Suffered at Work
• Afghans in US Immigration Limbo Watch Ukrainians Breeze Through
• As Pakistani Rupee Drops to Record Low, Finance Minister Blames Politics

Details:

Islamophobia: Muslims Describe Abuse Suffered at Work

A London-based charity that helps Muslims facing Islamophobia says people are being bullied and harassed at work because of their religion .Islamophobia Response Unit says clients have had prayers mats stolen and have been verbally and physically assaulted. Faiza Mukith, who works for the charity, said one man's colleagues had "physically pulled on his beard".They also referred to him as "Jafar" - the main antagonist in the Disney film Aladdin. Islamophobia Response Unit CEO Ms Mukith said a woman had bacon placed in her lunchbox by colleagues when she came to break her fast while working during Ramadan.  In the past four years the charity said it had dealt with 387 cases of discrimination. "In the beginning we saw a lot of hate crime cases, a lot of physical assault, verbal abuse, harassment in the street, but now we're seeing a lot more discrimination, especially discrimination in the workplace," she said. "It's on the rise - it's not changing." Recently, a survey of 1,503 UK Muslims by Savanta ComRes for online platform Hyphen found 69% of UK Muslims currently in employment said they had experienced some form of Islamophobia at work.  The problem is not just isolated to London - during the pandemic, West Midlands Police noted more than 9,000 race hate incidents were reported to the force. [Source: BBC].

Allah (swt) says:

[يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُواْ لاَ تَتَّخِذُواْ بِطَانَةً مِّن دُونِكُمْ لاَ يَأْلُونَكُمْ خَبَالاً وَدُّواْ مَا عَنِتُّمْ قَدْ بَدَتِ الْبَغْضَاء مِنْ أَفْوَاهِهِمْ وَمَا تُخْفِي صُدُورُهُمْ أَكْبَرُ قَدْ بَيَّنَّا لَكُمُ الآيَاتِ إِن كُنتُمْ تَعْقِلُونَ]

“O you who have believed, do not take as intimates those other than yourselves, for they will not spare you [any] ruin. They wish you would have hardship. Hatred has already appeared from their mouths, and what their breasts conceal is greater. We have certainly made clear to you the signs, if you will use reason.” [TMQ 3:118].

Afghans in US Immigration Limbo Watch Ukrainians Breeze Through

There are tens of thousands of Afghans who have applied for Special Immigrant Visas (SIV) whose applications are still being processed nearly a year after the botched US withdrawal from Afghanistan, a senior administration official said Monday, adding that the process will now be entirely overseen by the State Department. According to the official, as of last week, there were 74,274 principal applicants in the pipeline for the SIV, a visa meant for those who worked for the US government during its two decades of involvement in the war in Afghanistan. That number includes those who have not yet passed the chief of mission (COM) phase of the application -- a critical point in whether or not the visa gets approved -- and the senior administration official said that 40-50% of those in the pre-COM stage are turned down "for either not having the right documentation or not being eligible for various reasons." There are about 10,000 principal applicants who have chief of mission approval "and are essentially getting ready to get their documents to be able to be relocated," the official said on a call with reporters. That number does not include around 40,000-50,000 family members. The SIV program for Afghan nationals has been plagued with management problems and low annual caps for years leading up to the withdrawal by US forces. It's often a cumbersome and meticulous process and can take years to complete. The official said SIV processing is moving faster than before, noting that the State Department has surged resources to handle the processing. Now, having watched Ukrainian refugees receive comparatively quick processing – first under the general parole programme and later under the one the US set up specifically for Ukrainians in April – many Afghans have expressed frustration with what they see as discriminatory treatment by US immigration agencies, which has compounded the deep psychological distress many had already been experiencing as they wait to be evacuated. [Source: CNN and Al Jazeera].

The reason the Afghans are being mistreated by the US is that the Afghans are no longer in the front line against Russia and they are not European.

As Pakistani Rupee Drops to Record Low, Finance Minister Blames Politics

Pakistan’s finance minister has blamed the rupee’s slide on political turmoil, saying he expects market jitters over the currency’s sharp decline to subside soon. “The rupee downturn is not due to economic fundamentals,” Miftah Ismail told the Reuters news agency on Wednesday. “The panic is primarily due to political turmoil, which will subside in a few days.” The rupee fell 2 percent on Monday, and 3 percent on Tuesday, despite last week’s staff level agreement reached with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that would pave the way for a disbursement of $1.17bn under resumed payments of a bailout package. On Wednesday morning, the rupee was trading at 225 per dollar, having ended Tuesday at 221.99 after Fitch Ratings revised its outlook for Pakistan’s sovereign debt from stable to negative – though it affirmed the Long-Term Foreign-Currency (LTFC) and Issuer Default Rating (IDR) at “B-“. Emerging-market currencies are feeling the heat as the hawkish Federal Reserve lures capital towards the United States. The panic in the South Asian market also comes from escalating risks after former premier Imran Khan’s by-election win added to concern over the country’s bailout deal with the IMF, which it needs to avoid a default. “There is panic in the market, I fear it [the rupee] will go down further,” Zafar Paracha, secretary-general of the Exchange Companies of Pakistan, a foreign exchange association, told Reuters earlier on Wednesday.  Paracha said he did not see any reason for the depreciation in the rupee other than possible IMF pre-conditions. Neither the government nor the IMF has said anything about the need for any further depreciation of the currency, though Pakistan recently adopted a market-based exchange rate under advice from the lender under the economic reforms agenda. The finance minister said imports, which put pressure on the rupee, have been curbed and the current account deficit has been controlled in the first 18 days of June. Pressure on the rupee will ease moving forward, he said, adding that Pakistan had already worked out sources to meet its financing gaps. [Source: Al-Jazeera].

The lack of action by the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) to support the Rupee points to a devaluation at the behest of the IMF, as opposed to the Rupee falling due to political crisis. Once again the IMF has demonstrated that it has completed control over the economy of the country.