http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/04/us/politics/04web-cooper.html?_r=1 Looking for the Ideal Spot to Make a Speech By HELENE COOPER Published: December 4, 2008 WASHINGTON — President-elect Barack Obama’s aides say he is considering making a major foreign policy speech from an Islamic capital during his first 100 days in office. So where should he do it? The list of Islamic world capitals is long, and includes the obvious —Riyadh, Kuwait City, Islamabad — and the not-so-obvious — Male (the Maldives), Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso), Tashkent (Uzbekistan). Some wise-guys have even suggested Dearborn, Mich., as a possibility. Clearly it would be cheating for Mr. Obama to fly to Detroit, talk to Dearborn’s 30,000 Arab residents and call it a day. And Male and Ouagadougou, while certainly majority Muslim, can’t really be what Mr. Obama’s aides have in mind when they talk about locales for a high-profile speech that would seek to mend rifts between the United States and the broader Muslim world. So Burkina Faso and the Maldives are out. But that leaves a whole swath of Islamic capitals, all ready to be spruced up for Mr. Obama to make his speech. I’ve thought hard about this, and asked a few people — diplomats even — which capital Mr. Obama should pick. The consensus, after an entire day of reporting, is Cairo. Why Cairo? It’s a matter of elimination. I called Ziad Asali, the president of the American Task Force on Palestine, to gauge his thoughts. “Damascus would be cool, except it would look as if he was rewarding the Syrians and it’s too soon for that,” Mr. Asali said. True. Maybe in a year, if Syrian President Bashar al-Assad gets around to a land-for-peace deal with Israel. But for right now, I’m not really seeing Damascus as the spot for the big speech. What about Ramallah, I asked Mr. Asali, thinking it would show solidarity with the Palestinians. “I would object to that on so many levels,” he shot back, irate. “Are you forgetting that Palestinians seek Jerusalem as their capital?” Right. And giving the speech in Jerusalem would just open up a Pandora’s box full of problems. So that’s not happening. My colleague, David Sanger, heard me talking about it and came over to my desk. “I think he’s going to pick Jakarta,” he said. “It would be a big homecoming-type trip.” But Jakarta’s too easy. Mr. Asali thought so too: “Jakarta? People would yawn about that.” Sure, Indonesia is the world’s most populous Muslim-majority country — some 177 million Muslims live there — but the very fact that Mr. Obama once lived and went to school there would make choosing it seem like cheating. Baghdad? Definitely out-of-the-box, but it could appear to validate the Iraq war, which Mr. Obama opposed. Beirut? Too many Hezbollah members — Secret Service would flip its collective lid — and anyway, the Lebanese president has always been a Christian. Tehran? Too soon for that. Amman? Been there, done that. Islamabad? Too dangerous. Ankara? Too safe. Plus the Turks aren’t going to be too crazy about being used for outreach to the Muslim world when they’re trying to join the European Union. I asked a senior Turkish diplomat what he thought. He immediately started acting, well, diplomatic. “We don’t have a problem with our Islamic identity,” he said. “But our system is secular.” Riyadh? Mr. Obama’s national security aides say no. Kuwait City? Abu Dhabi? Doha? “I don’t think it will be in the Gulf,” one foreign policy adviser to Mr. Obama said. See? It’s got to be Cairo. Egypt is perfect. It’s certainly Muslim enough, populous enough and relevant enough. It’s an American ally, but there are enough tensions in the relationship that the choice will feel bold. The country has plenty of democracy problems, so Mr. Obama can speak directly to the need for a better democratic model there. It has got the Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamist organization that has been embraced by a wide spectrum of the Islamic world, including the disenfranchised and the disaffected. The Secret Service won’t like it one bit, but Cairo is no Islamabad. I called the Egyptian Embassy in Washington to ask officials there what they thought. Someone from Mr. Obama’s team had already mentioned the possibility, although embassy officials said Egypt has not been approached about a possible presidential trip to Cairo. Still, Sameh Shoukry, the Egyptian ambassador, e-mailed me a statement. “Needless to say, the President of the United States is always welcome in Egypt,” it said. “Delivering such a speech from Cairo would no doubt reinforce the intended message. Cairo has long been a center of Islamic learning and scholarship, in line with Egypt’s central role in the Middle East.”

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article5267860.ece A Muslim graveyard in the heart of Mumbai has broken with Islamic tradition and refused to bury the bodies of nine terrorists who were killed during the attack on India's financial capital. The influential Muslim Jama Masjid Trust, which runs the 7.5-acre Badakabrastan graveyard, said it would not bury the gunmen because they were not true followers of Islam. Hanif Nalkhande, a spokesman for the trust, said: "People who committed this heinous crime cannot be called Muslim. Islam does not permit this sort of barbaric crime." At least ten gunmen killed nearly 200 people in a series of coordinated attacks that began on Wednesday evening and swept south Mumbai. The strikes targeted two luxury hotels, the city's main train station, a hospital and a Jewish centre. During the attacks one militant said that the gunmen had been sent to avenge the abuses committed against Muslims in Indian-controlled Kashmir. Over three days, the Indian security forces killed nine terrorists and captured a tenth. The bodies of the nine dead gunmen now lie in a morgue awaiting last rites. The sole surviving militant - Azam Amir Kasab, 21, a Pakistani national - is being questioned by police. According to leaked details of the interrogation, he said that he and his fellow the terrorists were indoctrinated by being shown images of "atrocities on Muslims in India". Unclaimed bodies thought to be Muslim are traditionally given to the nearest Islamic graveyard for burial after three days but that now looks impossible in Mumbai. There are seven other Muslim graveyards in Mumbai, but the Jama Masjid's influence means none of the others are likely to accept the bodies. India has a history of bloody clashes between its minority Muslim community and Hindus, who account for aabout 80 per cent of the population. Police are now unsure what to do with the bodies, as officers do not believe anyone will claim the gunmen's corpses. Jain Sirmukadam, a senior police inspector, said: "The gunmen must be buried because we are bound to see that their last rites are performed according to the religion they follow. We have heard the trust's decision. We are considering what to do now." Mr Nalkhande from the trust said that several Islamic scholars had backed the body's decision. However, one Islamic scholar, Maulauna Zubair Ahmed, said that even terrorists must be given a proper burial under Sharia – or Islamic – law. "As per the Sharia, the trust cannot say no," he said. "The Sharia says whether a Muslim is a drunkard, rapist, criminal, you must offer him a place for burial."