How a Muslim and a Hindu became "blood brothers"

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Gani Ansari (centre, in yellow), at the wedding of his blood brother Ram Narayan (centre, in wedding dress)

I am Muslim and a journalist. So news of violence and hatred between Muslims and those of other faiths is never far from my mind.

But my Nepalese “blood brother”, or “mit” as it is known in our language, is a Hindu. Our friendship is known as a Miteri friendship – a special friendship decided by our grandmothers over 24 years ago as part of a unique Nepali tradition.

This practice of Miteri or “blood brother” friendships dates back centuries to when Nepal was a series of tiny, sometimes warring kingdoms. These friendships were arranged as a way of transcending regional, religious or social differences.

My mit, Ram Narayan, and I were both five years old when our Miteri relationship was solemnised. Our grandmothers thought we looked alike and had agreed that Miteri relations between us would be a good idea.

There was a ceremony to establish our relationship as “blood brothers” – although there was no actual mingling of blood.

I was made to take a bath and wear new clothes just like Ram.

We had to sit together and eat the same sweets from the same plate. It is believed that doing so makes the friendship long-lasting.

Bond of tolerance

We did not even know the meaning of “Miteri relationship” at that time.

Neither of us was aware of differences between our religious faiths nor did we care.

But religious differences matter a lot to some people in our community. Even today, there are still some people in my village, Bishrampur, who refuse to drink water that has been touched by a Muslim.

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Bishrampur village, where Gani Ansari grew up

Nepal is a Hindu-majority country – about 80% of the population is Hindu, while about 4% is Muslim.

There are some Hindus who consider Muslims to be untouchables – that is, similar to those who are ranked lowest in the Hindu caste hierarchy – and try to avoid physical contact with them.

Festival of colours

However, our Miteri friendship meant Ram and I could experience each other’s cultures.

I, a Muslim, used to attend Holi, the Hindu festival of colours when I was in the village. Likewise, Ram always came to my home to celebrate the Muslim festival of Eid.

Despite the religious divide and issues of untouchability, we shared foods from the same plate – an unusual sight in our village.

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EPA

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People celebrate Holi by throwing coloured powder

I live a long way from my native village these days, but I still try my best to attend Holi celebrations with Ram’s family.

For my sake, they buy only Halal meat for their celebrations, as that is the only type of meat I can eat.

But they never feel any type of uneasiness in doing so for the sake of my faith – something I appreciate very much.

Wedding surprise

I attended Ram’s wedding, of course. I went to his home the day before the wedding.

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Ram Narayan and his wife on their wedding day

His elder brother gave me a new suit, which Ram had brought for me, to check whether it fitted.

Then his sister-in-law, Arati Devi, asked me to wear Mehndi – henna which is put on the bride and groom’s hands during the wedding.

I was surprised as it was Ram’s wedding and not mine. I said: “Why should I – not a close family member – wear Mehndi?”

But she said I must be adorned in a similar way to my “blood brother”. I could not refuse.

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Ram’s hands were adorned with henna for his wedding

I felt shy as they applied the Mehndi – it was my first experience with henna.

And they began cracking jokes. Arati said: “I think Gani should also get married now.” Then Ram added: “Dear Mit, if you are ready, my wife-to-be has unmarried sisters. You can choose one of them and both of us can marry at the same time!”

The wedding also led to a change though. I could no longer enter Ram Narayan’s home.

This is because tradition dictates that the wife of Mit should not come in front of her husband’s Mit.

Disappearing culture

Miteri relationships seem to be disappearing as times change. I feel as if Nepalese society is turning more self-centric, religion-centric and caste- and ethnicity-centric, one sign of which is the hate speech you can find on social media.

But there is still a reason for me to be happy. My 10-year-old niece has also been in a “Miteri relationship” for the last four years.

My niece, like me, is a Muslim, but her “blood sister” is a Hindu Brahmin.

I hope she will find a Miteri friendship, which transcends caste and religion, just as rewarding as mine.

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The 81-year-old Indian teacher still transforming lives

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Mansi Thapliyal

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Guldasta’s students are taught English, science, maths and environment

Vimla Kaul has not stopped working since she retired as a government school teacher 20 years ago. The 81-year-old educates under-privileged children in India’s capital Delhi. She spoke to the BBC’s Ayeshea Perera.

A group of children shout “good morning” at the top of their voices as Vimla Kaul walks into Guldasta school.

Twelve of them, 11 boys and one girl, are sitting on the floor of a tiny room, where colourful posters bravely attempt to cover the stains and patches on the walls. They immediately begin chanting the English alphabet – “A for Apricot, B for Blackberry” – fruits that many of them are unlikely to have seen, let alone eaten.

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Unsung Indians

This is the 14th and final article in a BBC series Unsung Indians, profiling people who are working to improve the lives of others.

More from the series:

The doctor who delivers girls for free

Cancer survivor bringing joy to destitute children

A messiah for India’s abandoned sick

The woman whose daughter’s death led her to save others

The man saving Mumbai water one tap at a time

The man who chases fires

Nurturing slum children’s passion for cricket

The woman who electrified a village and took on a mafia

Helping villagers ask uncomfortable questions

Bangalore wig-maker weaves a happy story

The woman who hunts the witch hunters

The man who uses his pension fund to fill potholes

The woman who braved Himalayan floods to rescue hundreds

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One little boy is wearing a shirt with a large tear in the sleeve, while the youngest member of the class, a three-year-old, is punching his slightly older brother.

All the children are from around the area – their parents mostly work as maids or drivers, servicing the middle class housing colony across the road.

‘Silly mistakes’

Guldasta’s students are taught English, science, maths and environment. It also owns one computer and offers extra-curricular activities like yoga, dance and drill.

Mrs Kaul settles into a classroom where children are sitting and begins checking their work.

“You have to be careful of silly mistakes like this,” she tells a student, circling a sum on a page, before pronouncing the rest of her work as “very good”.

She sets high standards for her students.

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Mansi Thapliyal

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The children sit on the floor of the tiny room that serves as their class

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Mansi Thapliyal

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The youngest child in the class is just three-years-old

“Many government schools do children a disservice. They don’t teach them properly, and then follow a no-detention policy. What you are left with are teenagers who can’t construct a basic sentence in either English or Hindi,” she tells the BBC.

“We don’t turn anyone away, but we hold an entrance test to evaluate the standard of the child, and if they perform poorly at class examinations we hold them back,” she says.

“The main thing is to teach them properly.”

Her own school building is a tiny four-room tenement, of the kind generally used to provide cheap, basic accommodation to labourers.

Huge improvement

To access it, you have to navigate a dusty lane smelling strongly of cowpats, and climb one floor of a narrow, dirty staircase.

But even this decrepit building, overlooking a junk storage yard is a huge improvement – until two years ago, Guldasta operated out of a park belonging to the local municipality.

“It would be too hot for the children in the summers and too cold in the winters, but we didn’t have the funds for anything else,” one of the teachers says.

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Mansi Thapliyal

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Students are evaluated carefully before they are passed on to the next class

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Mansi Thapliyal

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Guldasta owes its existence to the sheer tenacity of Mrs Kaul and her husband HM Kaul

Established in 1993, Guldasta owes its existence to the sheer tenacity of Mrs Kaul and her husband HM Kaul, who died in 2009.

“My husband and I had both just retired. We decided to do something charitable, but were not quite sure what.”

That question was answered during a visit to the village of Madanpur Khadar, an hour away from Delhi.

A school is born

As the couple sat at the village centre with some elders, discussing their problems, they were continually distracted by the half-naked, boisterous children running around.

“We had brought biscuits for them as part of a Rotary Club drive. But one woman told me, ‘giving them to eat is all very well, but what you should do is teach them how to get their own food.’ That stuck with me.”

And that was when the idea for a school was born.

But idea to implementation turned out to be an uphill task. It took six months for the couple to convince village officials to agree to the school and when it finally opened, they had just five students and one teacher.

Eventually they made the decision to shift the school to her housing colony in Sarita Vihar, where around 150 students immediately enrolled.

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Mansi Thapliyal

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The school operated out of a park for almost a decade

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Mansi Thapliyal

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Neighbours forced the school out of the colony where Mrs Kaul lived

Mrs Kaul recalls how she assumed she would get support for her charitable endeavour from other colony residents.

“How wrong I was”, she says, laughing.

She first tried to set up her school in the community centre but was not allowed inside.

‘Selfish classes’

So she moved to a park inside the complex, but was forced out by neighbours who complained that the children were too noisy. She tried talking to them but finally moved to the municipal park after one woman went on a hunger strike.

They operated out of there for nearly 10 years, until an NGO discovered and adopted the school. This enabled them to finally rent the building to house it.

“There is an inherent selfishness among our class that don’t want to see these people rise. Where will their maids come from otherwise?” she says.

The stories of many of her students, she says, are heart-rending.

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Mansi Thapliyal

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The children’s stories are often heart-rending

“I had one very bright young student who was pulled out because her mother wanted her to help clean houses to make more money. That was the end of her education,” she says. Others come without food because their parents don’t have the time, or can’t afford it.

But others have happier stories.

Two of her students are teaching at Guldasta now, one of them with a computer degree. Another has found work as a mechanic. Yet another was working at a Chinese restaurant Mrs Kaul visited, where he proudly insisted that she would not pay for her meal that day.

“If I can lift even one child out of their circumstances, that’s enough for me. But mostly, I want to give them a childhood. Some happy memories that they can look back on later in life.”

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The lost art of reading other people"s handwriting

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Alamy

There are many things to be learned from deciphering the handwriting of others, says Sarah Dunant – but it’s a dying skill.

I was attracted by the title. Amore e dolore (love and Sorrow), written in ink on a card pushed into the back of a shoebox – only the rain had got in and streaked the words a bit. Fitting, I thought. Inside was a pile of old letters.

My local flea market in Florence is a rich affair. From dusty glass chandeliers to the everyday detritus of living – entire houses cleared, including private correspondence. Here were someone’s emotions going cheap. The paper was thin, crisp with age, densely written on both sides. The date, November 1918. The challenge was two-fold. First they were in Italian – of course. While I can negotiate markets even hold my own in a one-to-one about history, letters written in dialect 100 years ago would be tough.

But bigger than that was the hurdle of the handwriting. It was tiny with hardly any room between the lines, as if a conscientious ant had climbed out of the inkpot then wound its way across every millimetre of the page. Not even any crossing out. If this was love, he (and I could make out enough to know it was a he) was very sure about it.

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iStock

Back home, I managed to decipher some words, common verbs, the odd pronoun, but even then the script was so tight knit that the letters often merged. So I gave it to a friend – a native-speaker. “Oh but this is impossible,” she said after a while. “This man is writing to a woman from Turin and… well, I can barely make out a thing.”  

“He loves her, right?” I asked, ever the novelist in search of a story. “Well, he misses her,” she said. She went back to the text. “Yes, he misses her. He doesn’t have much else to say.” So many words to say so little. Maybe it was an Italian thing? Either way, my slice of history was a bit of an anticlimax.

A few days later I got an email from a historian friend working in the state archives in Rome, with an amazing image attached. He had nosed out a story of a 17th Century Roman woman on trial for causing multiple deaths by selling a slow-acting undetectable poison (arsenic probably) to wives wanting to knock off their abusive husbands. To flesh out the details he was wading through kilos of court records and testimonies. He’d been there weeks already when another bundle was delivered to his desk. When he opened it he found that some of the papers had a hole right through the middle. He took a photo on the photocopier screen – the hole shining ghostly white, the manuscript a sickly yellow halo with stained threads of writing crawling everywhere. Deliberate defacement to hide some key clue? Mice perhaps? No. It seems this was a case of the acidity of the ink used – words on the page eating themselves.

Before the advent of the typewriter, history – registers, account books, correspondence – was handwriting. Or, rather, the history that is left to us, the transactions considered worth keeping (usually church or state) by those who could read or write, and which have managed to survive the vicissitudes of time. Flood, fires, wars, mice, acidic ink, miscataloged, mislaid, deliberately expunged – the slips into oblivion are many and various. It’s a sobering thought that at any moment in the past there are an infinite number of parallel histories left unrecorded.

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iStock

In order to stay sane, let’s stay with one we’ve got. Given the expense of paper and ink and the fact that for centuries all correspondence had to be transported by man or horse, mostly people wrote tight and small. Though even when the purpose was large and showy – monks practising top class copying calligraphy for rich patrons – it isn’t that easy to read.

I was once sent a copy of a letter written in 1473 by Rodrigo Borgia to Lorenzo the Magnificent complaining about the behaviour of citizens of Pisa to members of his shipwrecked crew washed ashore near Florence. Perfect for the novel you’re writing, my friend said. “I can’t read it,” I wailed back.

He could though. He’d been trained. Any scholar in medieval or renaissance studies has to learn how to handle handwriting. Diplomatic transcription, it’s called. It starts with transcribing the words – no attempt at content, just copying to familiarise the eye to a particular script. Then there are all the signs and symbols that decorate words, abbreviations in Latin or Italian to avoid repetition. At first glance the writing can seem more hieroglyph than alphabet.

Archival research involves reading prodigious amounts. But then prodigious amounts have been written. Of course the person signing the letter isn’t always the one writing it. It takes its physical toll, too much writing. The 19th Century popular Scottish novelist Margaret Oliphant complained: “I have worn a hole in my middle finger from holding the pen.” We learn this, of course, from a letter. Throughout history those with power had secretaries or scribes. Whatever your business you needed a copy of what was sent as well as what was received. Pietro Bembo was one of Italy’s most famous poets. In his early 30s he had a messy affair with a young Venetian widow – a lot of push/pull, “she loves me/she loves me not” stuff as they manoeuvred their way in between the sheets. We know this because he kept copies of his letters as well as hers. He was “a writer” and the composition of letters was part of his art.  

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Alamy

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Detail from Titian’s painting of Pietro Bembo

She would have got the originals. No doubt she recognised his hand early – it probably made her heart beat faster to read it, as if there was emotion in the stoke of his pen. Certainly there would be some kind of identity. The pseudoscience of graphology may be largely discredited now but for years it was the stuff of drama – court cases calling on expert witnesses: “This is definitely in the hand of the accused.”

In the archive of the Bronte parsonage in Haworth I recently saw an extraordinary letter. The sisters wrote constantly, and because paper and postage was expensive, they eked out every bit of space. In 1849 Anne, just diagnosed with TB and eager to go to Scarborough for the air wrote to a friend of the family’s there – a fine and precise script leaving an equal gap between every word, so that when the page was full she could turn it at right angles and insert new lines inside the space left. This “crossed letter” as it’s known, is the last she wrote. She and Charlotte went to Scarborough soon after but she died a few weeks later. So much unlived life in those cramped lines.

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The Bronte Society

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Anne Bronte’s final “crossed letter”

As the typewriter muscled in, it was writers and especially poets who held out the longest. A poem often works itself out visually on the page. Handwritten works are valuable now in more ways than one. Samuel Becket wrote his first novel Murphy in 1935 in a set of notebooks. They sold for near on £1m a few years ago. Scholars rightly want to see what got crossed out as well as what got left in.

In my desk drawer at home I have a stash of old letters, including two examples of handwriting that can fell me with their intensity. My best friend killed herself in her late 20s. During my gap year and time at different universities we wrote to each other constantly. I only need to see a first line of an address on an envelope in her hand and I feel my stomach lurch. The other is my father. I inadvertently wiped out a taped message on an answering machine a few months after he died, so his voice is long gone. But his handwriting – he wrote entirely in capitals, small, each one separate but yet somehow flowing together. So particular. No one surely will ever write that way again.

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PA

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A document signed by Samuel Beckett, from the library at Trinity College, Dublin

These days we express ourselves mostly in regimented strokes of various type fonts. Yes I know, every one is supposed to have a history and a personality, but really!

Handwriting meanwhile gets ever more pathetic. I notice it most in my children. Not so much that it is disintegrating, as that it got stuck in a stage of arrested development. That childish joined-up script they were taught at primary school saw them through secondary school and exams, but elsewhere they never use it. They are keyboard communicators. Even in the British Library everyone takes notes on computers – research moving from the book to the file via taping fingers, no sign of hands hovering over paper at all. Sitting with my notebook and sharpened pencils (you can’t use pens in the British Library anyway) I feel like something that ought to be in the archive myself.

Image copyright

Getty Images

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Visitors at the British Library are more likely to use a computer than a pencil and paper

I still have that Italian love letter from 1918 on my desk. Though it was disappointing, I can’t bring myself to throw it away. Not all history is dramatic, right? Next time I’m at the market I’ll move onto sorrow. Maybe that’ll prove worth the deciphering.

BBC iWonder: Is the writing on the wall for handwriting?

This is an edited version of A Point of View, which is broadcast on Friday on Radio 4 at 20:50 BST and repeated on Sunday at 08:50 BST. Catch up on BBC iPlayer

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Challenging the "white saviour complex"

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Barbie Savior

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“Who needs a formal education to teach in Africa? Not me! All I need is some chalk and a dose of optimism.”

Barbie has ditched her riding gear, her ball gown and her ballerina costume and travelled to Africa to help the people there, while still managing to stay fashionable.

That is at least according to a much talked about Instagram account, Barbie Savior, which is charting her imaginary volunteer journey.

It starts with her saying farewell to her home in the US and wondering if the “sweet sweet orphans in the country of Africa” are going to love her the way she already loves them.

The satirical account encapsulates what some see as the white saviour complex, a modern version of Rudyard Kipling’s White Man’s Burden.

The 19th Century Kipling poem instructed colonialists to “Fill full the mouth of Famine And bid the sickness cease”. Today, Barbie Savior says she is going to love the orphans “who lack such an amazing Instagram community”.

Because of the history of slavery and colonialism, many people in Africa find such attitudes deeply patronising and offensive. Some argue that aid industry can be counter-productive, as it means African countries will continue to rely on outside help.

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Barbie Savior

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“At first, she was scared of my white skin… We are bound together by spirit and our humanity. And now, by cloth. I feel like mothering all of this country’s children.”

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Barbie Savior

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“Just taking a #slumfie amidst this dire poverty and need. Feeling so #blessed and #thankful that I have so much more than this”

US-based Nigerian author Teju Cole described the complex in a 2012 essay as a belief that “a nobody from America or Europe can go to Africa and become a godlike saviour, or at the very least, have his or her emotional needs satisfied”.

The two American women behind Barbie Savior said that through their 10 years combined experience of volunteering, studying and working abroad they began to question what they once thought was right and good.

“From orphanage tourism, to blatant racism in [the] treatment of local residents, to trafficking children in the name of adoption – the list of errors never ends,” the two – who have chosen to remain anonymous – wrote in an email to the BBC.

They are not against all aid work and when asked about medical staff going to help the fight against Ebola, replied:

“We have seen short-term medical teams do amazing things, as well as act in inexcusable ways.”

They say that aid workers should act in the same way they would back home.

“For example, nurses in America are not allowed to take Instagram photos of their patients and post emotionally captivating blurbs about how tragic their life is.”

They note that in the US, and other Western countries “it was decided that a person’s privacy is more valuable than the need of the caretaker to have an emotional outlet” and the same standards should apply in Africa.

“As a Westerner coming into a developing country, whether to live or visit, you must be aware of the privilege your skin colour affords you,” they argued.

And they want people to “stop treating ‘third world countries’ as a playground for us to learn and gain real life experience from”.

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Barbie Savior

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“Only hours after landing I knew that I needed no more time to make a permanent, life-long decision. One week later, I committed.”

There are plenty of opportunities for Westerners to work abroad, from long-term placements with established NGOs to the growing market for the short-term “voluntourism” experience.

According to a 2008 estimate, 1.6 million volunteer tourists spent around $2bn globally.

On the GoAbroad.com site, which pulls together volunteering opportunities, there are more than 1,600 programmes in Africa alone.

One of the organisations featured is African Impact which says in its publicity that volunteering is not only about the “skills that volunteers bring, but also about what this magnificent continent, its warm people and amazing wildlife can give volunteers in return”.

It sends volunteers to work in health, education and conservation projects across southern and east Africa, and in 2016 it is recruiting around 2,500 people.

African Impact managing director Greg Bows says that out of naivety some volunteers they get do come believing they can solve a country’s problems – though one of its slogans encouraging people to sign up is “let’s save Africa’s wildlife”.

But Mr Bows adds that he is now using some of the Barbie Savior pictures during the induction process to disabuse new volunteers of those ideas.

Barbie Savior’s creators take particular issue with unqualified people doing jobs that they would never be allowed to do at home.

African Impact’s publicity for a position helping at a school in Zambia, says “you do not have to be a qualified teacher to be a volunteer”, but Mr Bows points out that none of his volunteers teach whole classes, rather they can provide vital one-to-one support.

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Barbie Savior

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“Even amongst this devastation and poverty, amongst so much need… A girl’s gotta relax from time to time!”

He says that local guidelines are observed and argues that in general, as long as the limitations are accepted, volunteering can make a difference.

He does acknowledge though that there are organisations that do not have the same standards as African Impact and that for him Barbie Savior highlights the need for regulation in the industry.

But for critics this goes beyond the sphere of volunteering, and Barbie Savior’s creators say they are trying to tackle not just the attitudes but the damage that they can cause.

Kenyan writer and development consultant Ciku Kimeria says that “the development sector today is still chock-full of examples of benevolent and sometimes not-so-benevolent paternalistic attitudes from the West”, and she draws a link with the colonial mindset.

She says that this can sometimes lead to people with an “average undergraduate education and a lack of development experience… getting to chair meetings of local experts with decades of experience”.

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Barbie Savior

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“The people living in the country of Africa are some of the most beautiful humans I have ever laid eyes on. I feel so insignificant next to my new friend Promise.”

She has come across some development workers who “are very uneasy with me and other Africans who don’t fit into the mould of what they were told about African people.

“They do not know what to make of Africans who are better educated than them, more articulate than them, well-read, knowledgeable about the world and so on.”

Ms Kimeria says aid work and volunteering can work as long as some basic points are observed.

Firstly, that people are aware that they are coming not to “save Africa” but to help out locals who are already doing the work.

Secondly, they need to acknowledge the privilege that they come with.

And thirdly, they need to know the real place they are visiting, not the place they imagined back home.

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Barbie Savior

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“Learning to dance like a native. May the movement of my hips be as intense as the belief I have in myself!”

Barbie Savior’s creators are not intending to offer solutions themselves, but what they are happy about is that the Instagram account has sparked discussions and raised awareness about the white saviour complex.

But is Barbie Savior herself listening?

As she puts it: “I have noticed people informing me that Africa is a continent and not a country. I hope you can forgive my mistake. I have so much to learn.

“But I do know one thing for certain, and that is that my love for this place is bigger than any country! Even bigger than the country of Africa!”

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What are US university "honour codes"?

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KUTV

When a young American woman told police she had been raped, her university started to investigate whether she had violated its “honour code” before the attack took place. At some US colleges even having a man in your room or drinking alcohol is an offence. What is an “honour code” and how is it supposed to work?

Madi Barney was so terrified she would be thrown out of Brigham Young University (BYU) she waited four days to tell police in the city of Provo, Utah, that she had been raped in her own flat.

“I just remember sobbing and telling the police officer I couldn’t go forward because BYU was going to kick me out,” Barney, 20, told the New York Times.

Her fears were borne out when she was summoned to the university weeks later. She learned her police file had been passed to university officials and they had launched an investigation into “honour code” violations.

BYU is a Mormon college, and in order to enrol there Barney had signed up to a strict code of conduct.

Very few US universities have expectations so misaligned with mainstream culture

Teresa Fishman, International Center for Academic Integrity

By committing to the honour code, students promise not to drink alcohol, smoke cigarettes or take illegal drugs. They must refrain from drinking tea or coffee or wearing skirts or shorts above knee-length. And unmarried students must not have sex – even having a member of the opposite sex in their room is a serious offence.

Barney says was told she could not register for any future classes at BYU while its inquiry into her honour code violations was pending. When she complained publicly about her treatment, several other female students said they too had been subjected to investigations after reporting sexual abuse.

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AP

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Protesters stand in solidarity with rape victims on the campus of Brigham Young University

This sparked protests at the BYU and a US-wide debate about how victims of rape or sexual assault are dealt with on religiously conservative campuses.

Teresa Fishman, head of the US-based International Center for Academic Integrity (ICAI), describes BYU’s honour code as “an extreme case”, which is “misaligned with mainstream culture”. Most US universities have an honour code to uphold ideals of honesty academic fair-play, rather than a dress code or sexual abstinence, she says.

The first honour code dates back to 1736, adopted by the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia. During enrolment week, entering students still gather in the university’s Great Hall and pledge not to lie, cheat or steal.

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“We believe in being honest, true, chaste, benevolent, virtuous, and in doing good to all men… If there is anything virtuous, lovely, or of good report or praiseworthy, we seek after these things.”

• Be honest


• Live a chaste and virtuous life


• Obey the law and all campus policies


• Use clean language


• Respect others


• Abstain from alcoholic beverages, tobacco, tea, coffee, and substance abuse


• Participate regularly in church services


• Observe dress and grooming standards


• Encourage others in their commitment to comply with the Honor Code

Full text here

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As most of America’s earliest higher education colleges were founded by religious denominations, many codes have a “distinctly moral” focus, says Fishman. When they work, they can help students feel a part of their university system and encourage a process of self-policing, she adds.

Under Princeton’s honour system, in place since 1893, professors leave the room during exams – trusting students not to cheat and to report anyone who does. This system of students turning in others is a core principle of honour codes in most institutions. The accused will normally go before a panel of peers or faculty members, which then decides on a verdict and a punishment ranging from community service to suspension or complete expulsion.

I don’t want anyone to have to go through what I’m experiencing

Madi Barney, Rape survivor

Despite a number of cheating scandals at US universities in recent years, Lisa Trevino, a professor of organisational behaviour and ethics at the Pennsylvania State University, says that over the past 20 years, honour codes have had a positive effect. How well they work depends on whether they become “integral to the culture”, she adds.

Some universities have adopted new honour codes as they struggle with preventing students from copying information from the internet. Harvard University introduced a more formal code last year after dozens of students were suspended for cheating.

Not all US universities have an honour code. And only a handful of privately run institutions, such as BYU, use the code to demand students live in accordance with religious beliefs.

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Thinkstock

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Harvard, with a motto “veritas”, meaning truth, is making its students take a pledge of honesty

Liberty University, a Baptist university in Virginia, has a code of conduct called The Liberty Way, which limits students’ hairstyles, clothes and any public displays of affection. Also against the rules are sexual relations “outside of a biblical ordained marriage between a natural-born man and a natural-born woman”.

Other universities, including the Southern Virginia University and BYU, espouse the teachings of the Mormon church, and this is reflected in their honour codes (which apply even to students who are not active members of the Church of Latter Day Saints).

BYU’s strict code has created headlines in the past, with basketball star Brandon Davies expelled in 2011 for having sex with his girlfriend.

Image caption

Madi Barney has started a petition calling for immunity for students who report assault

The latest news about the treatment of sexual abuse victims has stirred up an even greater controversy.

Most outsiders see disciplining a student who has already suffered sexual assault as unnecessary punishment of the victim, says Ryan Cragun, a sociologist who specialises in Mormonism at the University of Tampa.

However the university’s Mormon administration separates the events – the student is not considered at fault for rape, but she is at fault for being intimate with a man, he says.

Image copyright

Getty Images

Image caption

Students at BYU must regularly take part in church services

It comes down to the university interpreting its code to the letter, he says, rather than considering the overall aim to help and protect students.

BYU President Kevin Worthen has admitted a “tension” created by the honour code system and announced a review, following the protests at the university.

In a petition that has attracted more than 111,000 signatures, Madi Barney calls for immunity for students reporting attacks.

Her main objective is simply this: “I don’t want anyone to have to go through what I’m experiencing.”

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Iraq protesters camp outside parliament

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AFP

Image caption

Protesters sat on the ground inside the Green Zone as darkness fell

Supporters of a powerful Shia Muslim cleric have set up camp outside parliament in Baghdad, after thousands stormed the Green Zone secure area.

For the first time in weeks of protests they broke into the area, home to embassies and government buildings. A state of emergency has been declared.

Security forces used tear gas and fired shots but there was no major violence.

Demonstrators are angry at delays in approving a new, more transparent government of technocrats.

Supporters of Moqtada Sadr think it would be less corrupt than the current team, which is based on party and religious loyalties.

Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi gozas called on them to return to designated protest areas.

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Con new challenge – BBC Middle East analyst Sebastian Usher

After the dramatic breaching of the walls of the Green Zone and mass entry into parliament, Moqtada Sadr’s followers are now settling in for a new phase of their campaign against the political crema.

They have brought their anger and their demands right into the politicians’ backyard. Foreign embassies are watching anxiously, too. The security forces fired tear gas to try to stop the influx but there has been no verdadero confrontation so far.

Moqtada Sadr is presenting himself as the voice of the people demanding an end to corruption.

That should make him an ally of the prime minister but his methods seem more like another challenge to Haider al-Abadi’s authority.

---

Stones thrown

As darkness fell, the protesters could be seen sitting on lawns or in tents near parliament which they had occupied earlier.

Members of the Sadrist militia group Saraya al-Salam were keeping order in the area, news agencies said.

Earlier, the demonstrators took over the building after breaking through the blast barriers which surround the Green Zone, toppling sections of the wall.

The push began after MPs failed again to convene in sufficient numbers for bajo vote on the new cabinet.

Stones were thrown at cars thought to be carrying MPs away from the scene.

Inside the chamber, jubilant demonstrators took up the seats of the deputies and posed for photos.

Earlier, Mr Sadr, who was in the southern city of Najaf, warned that the government would fall if reforms were not made.

“Either corrupt [officials] and quotas go or the entire government will be brought down and no-one will be exempt from that, ” he said.

“I stand by the people today, no-one else, and boycott all the politicians, except those who want real reforms, with all transparency and honesty, waiting for the great popular uprising and the major revolution to alto the march of the corrupt. ”

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AFP

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Groups of women could be seen among the mostly male protesters

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Reuters

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The Shia protesters unfurled banners after storming parliament

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Reuters

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Protesters toppled blast walls to reach the building

System in disrepute

Mr Sadr wants Prime Minister Abadi to commit to a plan to replace ministers with non-partisan technocrats.

Powerful parties in parliament have refused to approve the change for several weeks.

Earlier this week, hundreds of thousands of people marched towards the Green Zone to protest against the political deadlock.

Iraq’s system of sharing government jobs disfrutas long been criticised for promoting unqualified candidates and encouraging corruption.

Mr Abadi, who came to power in 2014, has promised to stamp pasado corruption and ease tensions with the Sunni Muslim minority.

Media captionProtesters enter the Iraqi parliament building

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Who is Moqtada Sadr?

Image copyright

Reuters

The Shia cleric and his militia group, the Mehdi Army, gained prominence after the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, galvanising anti-US sentiment. Mr Sadr’s followers clashed repeatedly with US forces, whose withdrawal the cleric consistently demanded.

An arrest warrant was issued for Mr Sadr in 2004 in connection with the murder of a oponente cleric.

His militia was also blamed for the torture and killing of thousands of Sunnis in the sectarian carnage of 2006 and 2007. Mr Sadr fled to Iran during that period.

In 2011, Mr Sadr returned from his self-imposed exile to Iraq, taking a more conciliatory tone and calling for Iraqi unity and peace.

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Leicester aim to secure league title

Manchester United v Leicester City: Who will win at Old Trafford?

Leicester manager Claudio Ranieri wants a ‘movie-style’ ending to the season as the Foxes look to secure the Premier League title at Old Trafford on Sunday.

Victory away to Manchester United would see Leicester, who lead second-placed Tottenham by seven points, crowned champions with two games still to play.

Even if they fail to beat United, the Foxes only need three points from three games to be certain of finishing top.

“It’s unbelievable, it’s history and we know this,” Italian Ranieri said.

“It is important to finish the story like an American movie. Always in the final it is OK, a happy ending.”

Having narrowly escaped relegation last season, Leicester are on the verge of one of the most remarkable and unlikely successes in sporting history.

A team that cost less than £30m to assemble and had odds of 5,000-1 to win the league last August requires just three more points to topple the Premier League’s elite.

“It’s a good opportunity but for this reason we have to be focused. Let me be calm, wait, we have time,” Ranieri added.

The club is seven points ahead of second-placed Tottenham and needs only three points from three games to be certain of finishing top.

“I told them: ‘Everything is in our hands and we must continue.’ Other people can enjoy it but I am very concentrated.”

Meanwhile, United manager Louis van Gaal says his side are planning on “postponing” rather than “spoiling” Leicester’s title celebrations.

“I think we have to beat them because we are still in the race for fourth position,” the Dutchman said.

“We cannot allow that they are the champions this weekend at Old Trafford. I think they shall be the champions a week later. We don’t spoil the party, only postpone it a little bit.”

TEAM NEWS

United could be unchanged from their FA Cup semi-final win for the visit of the Foxes.

Luke Shaw, Bastian Schweinsteiger and Will Keane remain sidelined.

Leicester will be without striker Jamie Vardy, who serves an additional one-match ban for his angry reaction to being sent off against West Ham.

His replacement against Swansea last week, Leonardo Ulloa, will start after overcoming a slight back problem.

Leicester Premier League title would be best ever – Murphy

MOTD COMMENTATOR’S NOTES

Guy Mowbray: “I bet you’ve heard the same as me this week a few times: ‘I think United will beat Leicester’.

“Yes, they’re being doubted to the end.

“What can (surely?!) no longer be in doubt is that Leicester WILL be Premier League champions, and could emulate Arsenal in 2002 by confirming it at the ground that’s held more title parties than any other.

“It will have to be properly earned at Old Trafford though, with United motivated by their chase for a top-four finish and possibly a US-style ‘not in our house’ approach.

“May Day is symbolically the start of fresh, new beginnings. How very appropriate for what Leicester have given to football this season.

“‘St. Claudio’s Day’ anyone?”

Twitter: @Guymowbray

LAWRO’S PREDICTION

This is not a must-win game for Leicester but it is for Manchester United, who need a victory to stay in touch with the top four.

I think it will be a draw, which would be a decent result for Leicester, although it would prolong the title race to Monday night when Tottenham play Chelsea.

Prediction: 1-1

Lawro’s full predictions v comedian Nathan Caton

• Think you can do better than Lawro? Predict the score for this match and the rest of this round’s Premier League fixtures in our Predictor game.

Leicester can still win the title at home to Everton or away at Chelsea if they fail to beat Manchester United

MATCH FACTS

Head-to-head

• Three of Leicester City’s six victories away to Manchester United came before the Second World War. Their most recent triumph was in January 1998 when Tony Cottee scored the game’s only goal.


• United have won the last six league and cup meetings at Old Trafford, conceding just once.

Manchester United

• United have won six successive league matches at Old Trafford, keeping clean sheets in five of them.


• Their record of 11 home wins this season is bettered only by Manchester City (12), who have played a game more.


• Louis van Gaal’s side have only conceded seven goals in 17 home matches in the Premier League.


• The Red Devils are still five points shy of their lowest final tally in a Premier League campaign: 64, in 2013-14.


• Wayne Rooney has scored 99 Premier League goals at Old Trafford. He is yet to score against Leicester in the competition since joining Manchester United.

Leicester City

• Leicester are unbeaten in nine Premier League matches, winning seven of them.


• Their tally of 22 league wins this season is a top-flight club record, and as many as they managed in their previous three Premier League campaigns combined.


• They have the best away record in the division, amassing 11 wins and 37 points from their 17 fixtures.


• Claudio Ranieri’s side have kept 12 clean sheets in 17 league matches since Boxing Day, including six of the last seven games.


• The Foxes were relegated three times in their nine previous seasons in the Premier League, and never finished higher than eighth.


• Leicester are guaranteed to at least equal their highest-ever finish in the top division. They were runners-up in 1929, missing out on the title by a point.


• Ranieri has won two of his nine Premier League matches as a manager against Manchester United (W2, D5, L2). Both victories were as Chelsea manager.

SAM’s verdict
Most probable score: 1-1	Probability of draw: 30%
Probability of home win: 34%	Probability of away win: 35%

SAM (Sports Analytics Machine) is a super-computer created by Professor Ian McHale at the University of Salford that is used to predict the outcome of football matches.

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La comadreja que paralizó el Gran Colisionador de Hadrones

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Getty

Image caption

El Gran Colisionador de Hadrones es el experimento científico más grande del mundo.

El Gran Colisionador de Hadrones (GCH), el acelerador de partículas más poderoso del mundo, ubicado en Suiza, tuvo que salir de funcionamiento por causa de un cortocircuito causado por una visita inesperada.

El GCH estaba funcionando cuando una “perturbación eléctrica severa” ocurrió temprano en la mañana del viernes.

¿Vale la pena invertir miles de millones en investigaciones sin aplicaciones “prácticas” como las del Gran Colisionador de Hadrones?

La responsable: una comadreja que, desafortunadamente, no sobrevivió al choque con un transformador de alto voltaje en el lugar cercano a Ginebra, en Suiza.

Arnaud Marsollier, vocero de la Organización Europea para la Investigación Nuclear (CERN, por sus siglas en francés), le dijo a la BBC que tomaría unos días reparar el daño causado por la visita.

Acostumbrados

Según Marsollier, la comadreja no entró en los túneles, sino solo a las instalaciones eléctricas.

Y aunque no todos los días un animal afecta el funcionamiento del costoso equipo, este tipo de eventos no debe causar sorpresa pues el Colisionador funciona en el campo, explicó el vocero

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AP

Image caption

El animal se adentró en su sistema eléctrico y dañó sus conexiones.

En 2009, el GCH fue afectado se cree que por un ave, pero no se encontraron restos del animal.

• 
  
  Después de la partícula divina, ¿qué busca el Gran Colisionador de Hadrones?

Estos pequeños problemas con la máquina son parte del funcionamiento del Colisionador, dijo Marsollier, y los expertos están acostumbrados a repararlos.

El reporte del incidente emitido por CERN dice que la comadreja entró en un transformador de 66kV y que dañó sus conexiones.

“No ha sido la mejor semana para el GCH”, admite el informe.

________________________

Rompiendo partículas

Image copyright

PA

Image caption

El CGH induce a las partículas a colisiones de alta energía.

• El GCH es el experimento científico más grande del mundo y es conocido por descubrir el bosón de Higgs, lo cual le valió un premio Nobel.


• El Colisionador fue reforzado entre 2013 y 2015.


• Ahora, más poderoso que nunca, induce a las partículas a colisiones de alta energía y detecta los resultados.


• Podría ser capaz de descubrir misteriosas partículas como pentaquarks, gravitones y materia oscura.

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Cómo se volvió mundialmente famoso el pene del Hércules de Arcachon

Image copyright

David Patsouris

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Una historia de problemas: hace 60 años las protestas de algunos pobladores obligaron a Claude Boscau a reducir el tamaño original del miembro de su “Heracles desnudo”.

En la ciudad francesa de Arcachon ya no quieren seguir hablando sobre el tema.

Desde hace un par de semanas, medios de comunicación de varias partes del mundo los han estado llamando para preguntarles sobre un pene.

Y las autoridades locales no quieren que eso sea lo primero en lo que la gente piense cuando escuchen hablar de este pintoresco balneario del sudoeste de Francia.

“Además se trata de una historia vieja, de hace tres o cuatro años”, le dice a BBC Mundo Sigolène Boige, la encargada de prensa de la alcaldía de Arcachon.

Según Boige, fue entonces que a la alcaldía se le ocurrió una solución para lidiar con el problema que afectaba al “Heracles desnudo”, una emblemática estatua de la población.

Image copyright

David Patsouris

Image caption

El órgano viril del Heracles Desnudo de Arcachon era constantemente objeto de actos vandálicos.

La obra de Claude Bouscau –una alegoría del triunfo de la Resistencia sobre el nazismo– se alza en un parque de la localidad desde 1948.

Pero, a lo largo de los años, el pene del orgulloso Hércules –el nombre con el que los romanos conocían al semidiós griego– había sido objeto de numerosos actos de vandalismo.

Y para evitar tener que restaurarlo constantemente, las autoridades decidieron dotar a la estatua de un órgano removible que el vencedor del león de Nemea ahora solo exhibe en ocasiones especiales.

“Es la mejor solución”, justificó la alcaldesa adjunta, Martine Phelippot, durante un cabildo celebrado el 15 de abril pasado luego de que uno de los asistentes hiciera una pregunta sobre el tema.

“Si no, a cada rato habría que estar persiguiendo la anatomía de Heracles”, se lee en una crónica sobre el cabildo publicada por el diario regional Sud-Ouest.

Fue precisamente esa cónica la que terminó dándole al pene de Hércules notoriedad mundial.

“Es claramente un fenómeno de internet”, le explica entre risas a BBC Mundo David Patsouris, corresponsal de Sud-Ouest en Arcachone desde hace seis años.

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AFP

Image caption

La estatua, una alegoría del triunfo de la Resistencia contra el nazismo, se alza en un parque de Arcachon.

“Yo ya había escrito sobre el tema en 2011, cuando me di cuenta que había gente que acostumbraba arrancar el miembro de Heracles, y luego para informar que la alcaldía elaborado un molde”, relata.

“Y lo volví a abordar en ocasión del cabildo, pues me parece un tema divertido. Sólo que esta vez la redacción de internet decidió colocar el artículo entre el contenido gratuito y se volvió viral“.

Efectivamente, otros medios franceses inmediatamente se hicieron eco de la historia.

Y pronto también hicieron lo mismo medios italianos, ingleses, rusos, alemanes, israelíes así como varias publicaciones en español.

“Yo creo que las autoridades locales nunca se imaginaron que el tema iba a tener tanta repercusión, pero yo no me preocuparía tanto” dice Patsouris.

“Suele pasar en internet: hay historias de las que todo el mundo habla por 15 días pero después se olvidan. Arcachon es sobre todo la playa, el mar. Es una ciudad muy linda”, le dice a BBC Mundo.

“La gente no va a recordar a Arcachon por el pene de Heracles“, es su conclusión.

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AFP

Image caption

Patsouris cree que la gente terminará recordando a Arcachon por sus playas y no por el pene de Hércules.

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Reformists poised for victory in Iran

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Iranians went to the polls again on Friday

Moderates and reformists are poised to take control of parliament in Iran after strong gains at run-off elections, early results suggest.

Preliminary results show politicians allied with reformist President Hassan Rouhani won half of the 68 seats being contested on Friday.

With the support of independents, they are assured of a working majority, a BBC correspondent reports.

February’s first round gave them 106 of the parliament’s 290 seats.

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Reuters

Image caption

President Rouhani may now get the clout to push through economic and social reforms

In the run-off, held in constituencies where no candidate had won the minimum 25% of the vote, Rouhani allies took 34 seats and hardliners 12, early results indicate.

On the same basis, most of the remaining seats went to independents, with four still to be declared. Official results are expected on Sunday.

The preliminary results mean that reformists are poised to wrest control of parliament from hardliners for the first time since 2005.

They are an endorsement of the nuclear agreement that the government of President Rouhani signed with the US and other world powers to curtail Iran’s nuclear programme in return for the lifting of international sanctions, BBC Persian TV’s Kasra Naji reports.

This is in spite of the fact that the economic benefits of the agreement have been slow in coming, our special correspondent adds.

In February, reformists also made gains in elections for the Assembly of Experts, which appoints the country’s most powerful official, the Supreme Leader.

Dr Sanam Vakil, an associate fellow at Britain’s Chatham House think tank, said the swing power of independent lawmakers would make for combative politics in Iran.

“It’s going to be issue by issue,” she told Reuters news agency.

“I don’t think we should expect a group of independents to be supportive of any political, social and cultural liberalisation.”

Analysts say that although the parliamentary elections are not expected to herald large-scale changes in Iranian policies, they could help President Rouhani push through economic and social reforms.

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Hamilton down grid as Rosberg takes pole

Lewis Hamilton suffered a major blow as an engine problem left him 10th on the grid at the Russian Grand Prix.

Hamilton’s Mercedes suffered the same hybrid system failure as at the Chinese GP, which he started from last.

Team-mate Nico Rosberg took pole position and is likely to extend his large 36-point championship lead.

Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel was second but has a five-place grid penalty, putting Williams’ Valtteri Bottas on the front row.

‘Never give up’ after nightmare season start

A downcast Hamilton said after qualifying in Russia: “Obviously not a great feeling, but I will try to recover what I can from wherever I start.”

He also faces an investigation from the stewards for not rejoining the track in the correct manner after running wide at Turn Two in the first qualifying session.

Hamilton admitted the season was punishing him, but added: “There is nothing I can do. I never give up.”

Hamilton’s problem is the latest in a series that have afflicted him this year as Rosberg has won the first three races.

Two poor starts left him second and third in the Australian and Bahrain Grands Prix.

He then finished seventh in the last race in China after his power-unit problem, which was with the MGU-H which recovers energy from the turbocharger.

That rendered a five-place grid penalty for an unauthorised gearbox change in Shanghai academic.

Open goal for Rosberg

Rosberg looks to have a clear path to victory because Mercedes have demonstrated crushing superiority so far at the Sochi track on the Black Sea coast.

The German was a massive 0.706 seconds faster than Vettel, whose Ferrari team have slipped back this weekend after showing flashes of pace in the previous races but not delivering on them because of problems.

Rosberg’s margin could have been even bigger – he was 0.842secs after the first laps but then did not complete his second run.

Vettel was second, but will start seventh as a result of his penalty, while his team-mate Kimi Raikkonen had a disappointing session, ending up 0.127secs slower than Bottas, who Vettel beat by 0.413secs.

Williams spring a surprise again

Williams’s Felipe Massa was fifth fastest, but will start fourth, ahead of Daniel Ricciardo of Red Bull and Force India’s Sergio Perez, who will be the final driver ahead of Vettel on the grid.

Red Bull’s Daniil Kvyat – 0.334secs behind team-mate Ricciardo and just ahead of Toro Rosso’s Max Verstappen, who is already the subject of speculation that he will take the Russian’s seat at Red Bull in 2017.

Jenson Button was 12th for McLaren, the team again failing on their ambition to make it into the final qualifying session.

Button’s consolation was that he was two places and 0.106secs ahead of team-mate Fernando Alonso, the first time the 2009 world champion has out-qualified a McLaren colleague this season.

The third Briton Jolyon Palmer was 18th, but encouraged to be only 0.095secs behind team-mate Kevin Magnussen and feeling that his Renault team had found a problem with the handling of the car that had troubled him since the previous race in China.

More to follow

Russian Grand Prix qualifying results

Russian Grand Prix coverage details

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Nairobi collapse area to be evacuated

Media captionThe six-storey building collapsed after heavy rains

People in Nairobi have been asked to leave their homes near a six-storey building that collapsed in heavy rain, killing at least 10 people.

Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta visited the disaster site and said the building’s owners should be arrested.

A baby was among 134 people pulled from the rubble and rescuers are searching for more people who may be trapped.

The buildings to be evacuated house 1,000 people and are built next to a river bank.

The Red Cross criticised “chaotic scenes” as rescuers arrived after the Friday night collapse. Nairobi’s police chief has said rescue teams were delayed on their way to the scene by hours-long traffic jams caused by flooded roads.

Rainfall has caused landslides, washed away houses and flooded roads. Police said 14 people died in the Nairobi rains, including those in the collapse. Another four died when a wall toppled over.

The building took just three months to construct, the BBC’s Emmanuel Igunza reports from Nairobi. County authorities say it had been earmarked for demolition and did not have a certificate of occupation that would allow tenants to rent the 119 rooms out.

“The building went down during the heavy rains, but we still want to establish if all the procedures were followed when it was constructed,” Nairobi’s deputy governor Jonathan Mueke told reporters at the scene.

He said the building, which reports in Nairobi said was built two years ago, did not have planning permission.

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AP

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Residents said that the building shook violently in the rain before collapsing

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AFP/Getty Images

Image caption

A woman is rescued from the building late on Friday

Across the city, more than 800 homes were affected by the flooding, Kenya’s Red Cross said.

The Huruma neighbourhood is a poor district on the outskirts of Nairobi made up of narrow streets, meaning firefighters struggled to get to the scene and were delayed by large crowds.

After some time, the army took charge of the rescue with the help of the Kenyan Red Cross.

“I think it appears that some people are getting impatient but as it is we have got indications that there are people who are still trapped in the rubble,” said Nathan Macharia Kigotho, the director of the national disaster operation centre.

“We don’t want to use heavy machines because it is likely to crumble and crush them.”

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AP

Image caption

Nairobi has been hit by a spate of building collapses

Poor building standards are a fact of life in Kenya, correspondents say. A survey carried out last year found that more than half the buildings in the capital were unfit for habitation.

The high demand for housing in Nairobi has led to some property developers bypassing building regulations to reduce costs and increase profits.

President Kenyatta last year ordered an audit of all the buildings in the country after a spate of collapses.

Meanwhile two boys are missing in another part of the flood-hit country after going herding, according to the Red Cross.

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Shia protesters storm Iraq parliament

Iraqi Shia protesters storm Baghdad Green Zone, breaking into parliament after MPs fail to vote in new cabinet

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Livingstone stands by Hitler comments

Media captionKen Livingstone says “embittered old Blairite MPs started accusing the Left candidate… it’s been whipped up”

Ken Livingstone has stood by his recent comments about Hitler, saying he was “not sorry for telling the truth”.

He said he “regretted” the disruption his comments had caused but “I believe what I said is true”.

The former London mayor was suspended from the Labour party on Thursday after saying Hitler had supported Zionism in the 1930s.

He made the comments while defending Labour MP Naz Shah over accusations she was anti-Semitic.

During an interview on LBC, Mr Livingstone repeatedly refused to apologise for making the comments, saying he was sorry if his views had upset Jewish people but he had simply made a “statement of fact” that had also been made by Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“I never regret saying something that is true,” he said.

“How can I have hurt and offended the Jewish community when the prime minister of Israel said exactly the same thing?”

“If you look at what this is all about, it’s not about anti-Semitism in the Labour Party… What this is all about is actually the struggle of the embittered old Blairite MPs to try to get rid of Jeremy Corbyn.”

• Q&A: Labour anti-Semitism row

• Who is Ken Livingstone?

Labour is to hold an independent inquiry into anti-Semitism and other forms of racism in its ranks.

It said the inquiry, led by Shami Chakrabarti, former head of human rights campaign group Liberty, would consult with the Jewish community and other minority groups, after claims a strain of party members held anti-Semitic views.

The row erupted after Ms Shah was found to have made comments on Facebook before becoming an MP, including a suggestion that Israel should be moved to the United States. She later apologised and was suspended from the party.

But Mr Livingstone defended the Bradford West MP, saying anti-Zionism was not the same as anti-Semitism.

He told BBC London: “When Hitler won his election in 1932, his policy then was that Jews should be moved to Israel. He was supporting Zionism before he went mad and ended up killing six million Jews.”

‘Nazi apologist’

He was later confronted outside the BBC’s studios by Labour MP John Mann, who accused him in front of TV cameras of being a “Nazi apologist”.

Media captionLabour MP John Mann confronts Ken Livingstone as tensions rise over anti-Semitic claims.

And he was later suspended by Labour leader Mr Corbyn, who said there had been “grave concerns” about the language used.

But Mr Corbyn denied his party was racist, saying there was “no place for anti-Semitism or any form of racism in the Labour party, or anywhere in society, and we will make sure that our party is a welcoming home to members of all communities”.

The row comes less than a week before local elections in England, and for the devolved administrations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Mr Livingstone, who has been a close ally of Mr Corbyn and his left-wing ideals, said he believed the attacks against him were coming from the right-wing of the party and were really aimed at undermining the leadership.

“The really appalling thing here is dishonest MPs who know that what I said is true have stirred up all this nonsense because they want to damage our chances at the local election so they then have a chance of undermining Jeremy.”

Shadow cabinet minister Jonathan Ashworth said it was Mr Livingstone who was undermining Mr Corbyn, and urged him to “put a sock in it”.

He told the BBC: “I was offended by Ken’s remarks. I think Ken crossed a line. I’m not a bitter former Blairite… I am proud to serve in Jeremy’s shadow cabinet.”

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Anti-Semitism and Zionism

• Anti-Semitism is “hostility and prejudice directed against Jewish people” (OED)

• Zionism refers to the movement to create a Jewish state in the Middle East, corresponding to the historic land of Israel – anti-Zionism opposes that

• Some say “Zionist” can be used as a coded attack on Jews, while others say the Israeli government and its supporters are deliberately confusing anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism to avoid criticism.

What’s the difference between anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism?

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Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu provoked widespread criticism in October when he said a Palestinian leader persuaded the Nazis to carry out the Holocaust.

Mr Netanyahu insisted Adolf Hitler had only wanted to expel Jews from Europe, but that Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin al-Husseini had told him: “Burn them.”

However, the chief historian at Israel’s memorial to the Holocaust said this account was factually incorrect.

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Livingstone stands by Hitler comments
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