30 demonstrators protest tracking of Muslim males (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)

 30 demonstrators protest tracking of Muslim males

Saturday, February 22, 2003

By Torsten Ove, Post-Gazette Staff Writer

While the usual Friday naturalization ceremonies for new citizens wrapped up at the federal courthouse Downtown yesterday, a knot of 30 people turned out at the Federal Office Building across the street to protest the treatment of Muslim immigrants in John Ashcroft's America.

	A group of Muslims prays yesterday outside the Federal Office Building, Downtown. The group, organized by Jamaat for Justice, was demonstrating because it believes the Bush administration is unfairly targeting minorities in the war on terror. (John Beale, Post-Gazette)

Their specific complaint is the "special registration" of males over 16 from mainly Muslim countries who will be fingerprinted, photographed and questioned by the U.S. Immigration & Naturalization Service.

The protesters, organized by Jamaat for Justice, a Pittsburgh-based Muslim activist group, said the Bush administration is unfairly targeting minorities in the war on terror, just as America has done before in times of crisis.

"John Ashcroft, read a history book," said Witold Walczak, legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union. "When you restrict freedom and individual rights, you are doing more harm than good."

Walczak invoked government crackdowns on Bolsheviks in the 1920s, Japanese-Americans during World War II and Communists in the McCarthy era.

"Were we any safer? No," he said. "A whole bunch of innocent people got screwed."

Saleh Waziruddin, a Canadian citizen who has dual Pakistani citizenship, organized the protest. An engineer at Carnegie Mellon University's Center for Advanced Fuel Technology, he'll have to register, a process he says amounts to profiling based merely on faith and national origin.

"It targets people based on where they're from, not on evidence," he said. "We don't want them to go after people just for what country they come from."

After a few speakers addressed the group, a few of them knelt on rugs and chanted prayers while federal employees walked in and out of their building. There were no confrontations.

This week, the INS deadline for registration was extended for another month by the Justice Department.

About 15,000 males age 16 or older from Saudi Arabia and Pakistan will have until March 21 to be fingerprinted, photographed and show certain documents at INS field offices.

Another group of about 19,000 from Bangladesh, Indonesia, Egypt, Jordan and Kuwait will have until April 25 to register, four weeks beyond the original March 28 deadline.

The registration program is part of an effort by the INS to tighten security at U.S. borders and track foreign visitors whose visas may have expired or who may be here illegally.

In all, about 46,000 students, tourists and people nationwide on business from 25 countries are being required to register if they want to stay in the United States for an extended period.

Seven suspected terrorists have been identified because of the program, along with 401 criminals or others who should not be permitted entry in the country, according to the Justice Department.