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"Perhaps the delay is caused by the government's hope of 'possible future statements by Mr. Ramadan' that might justify exclusion," said the judge. |
NEW YORK — A US federal judge issued on Friday, June 23, a three-month deadline for the Bush administration to rule on a visa application by prominent Muslim intellectual and scholar Tariq Ramadan.
"The government has failed to adjudicate Ramadan's pending B-visa application within a reasonable period of time," Judge Paul Crotty, Reuters reported.
Ramadan, one of Europe's best known Muslim intellectuals, has been barred from entering the US since 2004 after his visa was revoked by authorities.
He applied for a non-immigrant visa in September last year, but US officials have stalled on deciding his request, citing national security concerns.
Judge Crotty said the US government explanations on delaying a decision on the visa application was "less than convincing".
"If the government has a legitimate and bona fide reason for excluding Ramadan, then it may exclude him," he said.
"But it must do so by acting on the pending visa application, not by studying Ramadan's application indefinitely."
Heather Tasker, a spokeswoman for the US Attorney's Office, said the government was reviewing the decision.
The lawsuit was brought by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) on behalf of the American Academy of Religion, the American Association of University Professors and PEN American Center -- all of which had invited Ramadan as a guest speaker.
Fishing
The federal judge mocked the administration's procrastination in processing the visa application.
"Perhaps the delay is caused by the government's hope of 'possible future statements by Mr. Ramadan' that might justify exclusion," he said.
"But in waiting, the government does a disservice not only to Ramadan, but also to the visa application process and to the plaintiff's First Amendment rights," averred the judge.
He called that Ramadan had spoken out against terrorism and had also been enlisted by the British government as an expert on how to combat extremism.
Ramadan teaches at England's Oxford University and has been a lecturer of Religion and Philosophy at the University of Fribourg and the College de Saussure, Geneva.
The 41-year-old scholar was scheduled to take up a teaching post at the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana, when his visa was revoked at the last minute.
The author of 20 books and 700 articles on Islam, including "Western Muslims and the Future of Islam," Ramadan has been tirelessly encouraging Muslim minorities across Europe to integrate more into their respective societies.
He was named by Time magazine as one of 100 innovators of the 21st Century for his work on creating an independent European Islam.
Over a dozen US academics protested the visa denial and the Chicago Tribune described it as a punishment for his views on Iraq invasion and Israeli policies.
The Guardian recently reported that US professors and teachers were facing hard time speaking their minds out and criticizing the Bush administration's foreign policy with federal anti-terror sheriffs watching and students paid to tape "anti-America" statements.
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