Bush and others convicted of war crimes in Malaysia.

[Saxtonite]

Didn't Spain and Argentina try Rumsfeld and some other Bush Regime official for war crimes earlier and find them guilty, just not Bush personally?

[slebetman]

I have a few friends from there (who are not malays/muslims) so maybe I have a skewed impression.

However, Muslims (defined as children of Muslims and converts) are bound by the Islamic law and cannot legally leave Islam in most of the country.

snip..

You are correct that Muslims are legally unable to convert, and this is something of an issue, but like I said, this is an issue where the way forward is for Muslims themselves to foster change.

Hang on, this is a very big piece of misinformation. In most of malaysia muslims have legal rights to convert. They just have to do it officially by getting permission from the relevant state authorities. Yes, most states require that the applicant attend religious counselling as part of the application process. And yes some states try harder than most to prevent it but all states are required by federal law to have some mechanism for dealing with it.

Here's some statistics for the period between 2000-2010:

State: applications / approvals
-----------------------------
Sabah: 238 / 67
N.Sembilan: 172 / 33
Selangor: 99 / 0
Federal Territories: 56 / 10
Perak: 47 / 12
Penang: 36 / 1
Melaka: 12 / 3
Pahang: 8 / 7
Johor: 8 / 0
Kedah: 5 / 1
Perlis: 3 / 1
Sarawak: 1 / 0
Terangganu: 1/ 0
Kelantan: 0 / 0

So it is possible. It just doesn't happen often. Most states have a policy of never rejecting an application for conversion (apostasy). Instead applicants are coaxed to change their mind and withdraw their application.

As for waiting for us muslims to foster change to make apostasy easier, not only is it not likely to happen but most (even very liberal ones) see this as a problem and would like to go the opposite direction.

As a side note. There have been cases in the past of people using apostasy as a last defense in syariah court. The ones I know were people charged with heresy. As a last line of defense they declare themselves apostate and therefore outside the jurisdiction of syariah courts.

[AniThyng]

Well then I concede that point, but franky I don't think it changes the substance of my argument, which is only muslims themselves that are on a position to change things