Protecting the Rights of Religious Minorities in the Framework of International Human Rights Law and Islamic Law

Abstract

This paper is a legal analysis, which tries to examine multi-dimensional problems to protect the rights of religious minorities especially their freedom of belief. The distinctive feature of religious minorities is often seen as a threat to Islamic orthodoxy as well as the concept of religious harmony within Muslim society. Therefore, the history of persecution against intra and inter religious minorities in many Muslim societies has increased over time. One of the major problems is that some Muslims still follow the out of date Islamic law produced by early Islamic jurists to respond contemporary human rights problems as well as the failure to develop humanism and equity values as the inviolability principle of human rights in Islam. This essay however assumes that Islam in nature does not oppose the norms of international human rights law and therefore Muslims should expand the application of international human rights law and Islamic law to protect the rights of religious minorities.