Presentations Tuesday May 1

Miranda

Attorney General v. X.

Ireland. Supreme Court.

Abstract

KIE:

In this case in which a 14-year-old girl said she had become pregnant after being raped by her friend's father, the Attorney General of Ireland had enjoined the girl and her parents from traveling to England for an abortion. A psychologist had testified that in her present state of mind, the girl was suicidal. The Supreme Court of Ireland held that the right to life supersedes all other rights, including the right to travel. However, if there is a real and substantial risk to the life of the mother which can only be avoided by termination of the pregnancy, then an abortion is permissible. The Court determined that the girl's risk of suicide satisfied this condition, and therefore the girl was allowed to terminate her pregnancy.

Tyler - 

The bitter, bloody feud between the two branches of Islam, the Sunnis and the Shi’ites, has gone
on for centuries and now this vicious sectarian strife is exploding again in Bahrain, threatening to
cause an even greater conflict in the Middle East between Saudi Arabia and Iran.

The implications of the worsening hostility for the world are nightmarish, for the entire region
could soon be gripped by turmoil, bloodshed and economic meltdown. What was naively seen
a few weeks ago as a fight between freedom and autocracy could descend into an epic clash
between two Muslim ideologies, the savagery made all the worse by their long history of enmity.

The roots of the hostility between Sunni and Shia lie not in profound theological differences,
but in the political intrigues that took place in the Muslim world in the 7th Century. When
the Prophet Mohamed died in AD 632, the question of the succession to his leadership was
dominated by family rivalries and disputes.

Essentially, there were four candidates to succeed as ‘caliph’, or leader, and one group in
particular, which went on to form the Shi’ites, strongly favoured the claims of Ali, the grandson
of Mohamed. Even the name, Shi’ite, derives from ‘party of Ali’. But three times in succession,
Ali was passed over as each of the other candidates was chosen before him.

The opposition to Ali deepened the sense of anger among his supporters. Eventually, in this
climate of tribal factionalism, Ali became the fourth caliph, though the indignation of his
followers was provoked when he was then brutally assassinated.

The tribal feuding in the post-Mohamed era reached its climax at the Battle of Karbala in AD 
680. This is really the key moment in the creation of the Shi’ite movement, the point at which the
fissure was permanently established.