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<DIV>Lets take a look at a place where evidently there is no Freedom of
Speech.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Dick Schmidt</DIV>
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<DIV style="MARGIN-RIGHT: 165px"></DIV><FONT size=+2><B>Fallaci charged in Italy
with defaming Islam</B></FONT><BR>
<P><FONT size=-1>By Crispian Balmer<BR>Reuters<BR>Wednesday, May 25, 2005; 8:13
AM<BR></FONT>
<P><NITF>
<P>ROME (Reuters) - A judge has ordered best-selling writer and journalist
Oriana Fallaci to stand trial in her native Italy on charges she defamed Islam
in a recent book.</P>
<P>The decision angered Italy's justice minister but delighted Muslim activists,
who accused Fallaci of inciting religious hatred in her 2004 work "La Forza
della Ragione" (The Force of Reason).</P>
<P>Fallaci lives in New York and has regularly provoked the wrath of Muslims
with her outspoken criticism of Islam following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on
U.S. cities.</P>
<P>In "La Forza della Ragione," Fallaci wrote that terrorists had killed 6,000
people over the past 20 years in the name of the Koran and said the Islamic
faith "sows hatred in the place of love and slavery in the place of
freedom."</P>
<P>State prosecutors originally dismissed accusations of defamation from an
Italian Muslim organization, and said Fallaci should not stand trial because she
was merely exercising her right to freedom of speech.</P>
<P>But a preliminary judge in the northern Italian city of Bergamo, Armando
Grasso, rejected the prosecutors advice at a hearing on Tuesday and said Fallaci
should be indicted.</P>
<P>Grasso's ruling homed in on 18 sentences in the book, saying some of
Fallaci's words were "without doubt offensive to Islam and to those who practice
that religious faith."</P>
<P>MUSLIMS HAIL DECISION</P>
<P>Adel Smith, a high-profile Muslim activist who brought the original law suit,
hailed the decision.</P>
<P>"It is the first time a judge has ordered a trial for defamation of the
Islamic faith," he told reporters. "But this isn't just about defamation. We
would also like (the court) to recognize that this is an incitement to religious
hatred."</P>
<P>Justice Minister Roberto Castelli, who has a prickly relationship with the
Italian judiciary, said the ruling represented an attack on freedom of
expression.</P>
<P>"In Europe we are seeing the birth of a movement that is looking to silence
those who don't follow a single mindset, within which it is forbidden to speak
ill of Islam, of homosexuals or of the children of homosexuals," Castelli was
quoted as saying in an interview with Radio Padania.</P>
<P>"In Fallaci's book there is very strong criticism but not defamation,"
Italian news agency ANSA quoted him as saying.</P>
<P>There was no immediate comment from Fallaci who is in her 70s and suffers
from cancer.</P>
<P>Just weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks, Fallaci published "La Rabbia e
l'Orgoglio" ("The Rage and the Pride"), in which she said the West was superior
to Islamic society and complained that Muslim immigrants had "multiplied like
rats."</P>
<P>The book sold more than one million copies in Italy and at least 500,000
elsewhere in Europe.</P>
<P>Fallaci received numerous death threats following its launch and "La Forza
della Ragione" was billed as her response to the outpouring of anger.</P>
<P>No date was set for the opening of the defamation trial.</P></NITF><!-- start the copyright for the articles --></DIV></BODY></HTML>