In recent years, a number of pirate radio stations have sprung up in Pakistan’s tribal areas, reports Mukhtar A. Khan in the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor (May 26). It started with the establishment of an extremist Sunni radio station in 2003. Infuriated by the views spread on this station, a Sufi group then launched its […]

Calvinism may have a brighter future than Pentecostalism in China, writes Andrew Brown in his blog on the Guardian website (May 27). As China has liberalized it policy on religion, seeking an ideology and ethic for its elite classes, observers have speculated on potential candidates that may play this role. Brown writes that for Chinese […]

Although it has not been successful with all who went through it—some re-emerged later as jihadist fighters—Saudi Arabia’s rehabilitation program for former militants has been praised as a success. But it cannot easily be exported to other Muslim countries, writes Kamran Bokhari in Stratfor’s Global Security and Intelligence Report (May 14). Aside from the financial […]

Despite discrimination experienced in Saudi Arabia, the Shiite minority is unlikely to engage again in actions such as the bloody street protests of the 1970s and 1980s. This is especially the case since “Saudi Shiites are strongly aware of their limited political options” and prefer to seize options offered by the political system and to […]

Due to the increasing influence of Islamic, conservative and even radical views in Indonesian society, observers had expected a rise in the vote for Islamic parties, but this has not been the case: Muslim-based parties have secured less than 24 percent of the total votes; however, this does not mean a reversal of the trends […]

Hindu militias are growing in India, targeting not only Muslims and Christians, but also dissident Hindus, according to political scientist Christophe Jaffrelot during a recent New York lecture. Jaffrelot, of Science Po in Paris, presented a paper at a Columbia University seminar in late March, attended by RW, which argued that “Hindu terrorism” is emerging […]

For the past few years, the Chinese Communist Party has shown an eagerness to praise “correct” Buddhism, in contrast with its criticism of the Dalai Lama. This has been evidenced again in the Second World Buddhist Forum, which gathered in the Eastern Chinese city of Wuxi in late March, writes Peter Fischer, correspondent in China […]