Religious leaders persuade Mauritanian inmates to renounce violence

2010-02-05

Most of the radical Islamist inmates who participated in Mauritania's first-ever "spiritual dialogue" with Islamic scholars have signed a "renunciation of violence", Journal Tahalil reported on Thursday (February 4th). "The young people have largely abandoned their ideas based on extremism, violence and takfir", said Mohamed El-Moctar Ould M'Balla, spokesman for the commission of theologians. All but 3 of the 67 inmates who attended the recent talks at Nouakchott's central prison repented when the imams showed them errors in their understanding of the religious concepts that underlay their actions, Ould M'Balla told the press.

Suspects in the 2007 ambush slaying of a French tourist family in Aleg and the fatal shooting of an American teacher last year in Nouakchott are among the 67 alleged jihadists awaiting trial who attended the landmark dialogue. Inmates who signed the renunciation of violence could reportedly receive a presidential pardon.

Source: Magharebia.com
Link: http://magharebia.com/en_GB/articles/awi/newsbriefs/general/2010/02/05/newsbrief-04.