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http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=53526

"Pastors' convictions for quoting Quran overturned
Case was brought under version of 'hate crimes' legislation"
Posted: December 28, 2006
1:00 a.m. Eastern

© 2006 WorldNetDaily.com

ARTICLE SNIPPET: "Two Australian pastors who were convicted of "vilifying" Muslims when they quoted from the Quran during a seminar on jihad have had their appeals upheld by the Victorian Supreme Court.

And while that means they will return to a lower court for another trial, that actually is a good result, according to a new report from Voice of the Martyrs.

"In a sense we are happy with this decision… It means this case will be kept alive in the public consciousness," Pastor Danny Nalliah said in a VOM report. "There's a need to keep these vilification laws in sharp focus to reveal the problems this law is creating."

(Story continues below)

The Australian law was imposed in order to prevent the denigration of people based on their race or religion, and similar laws also have been approved in Canada, where critics of the law say they include sexual orientation and forbid pastors from condemning homosexuality as a sin.

Many of the "hate crimes" proposals in the United States are based on a similar concept: designating as "crimes" the statements people make about their own beliefs or convictions.

In a statement released through Catch the Fire Ministries, where Nalliah serves as president, he thanked his friends for their moral, prayer and financial support during the trial and appeal process to date.

"The battle for Freedom to express Truth is far from over, as a retrial at the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (with a different Judge) is expected sometime next year… I believe the Lord will continue to use this case to further awaken His Church, our nation of Australia, the nations of the world, and to discredit the vilification laws in Victoria," he wrote.

Nalliah and Pastor Daniel Scot were charged following a complaint filed by The Islamic Council of Victoria, and were the first people found guilty of religious vilification under the Victorian Religious and Racial Tolerance Act of 2002. They were accused of vilifying Muslims at a seminar on jihad on March 9, 2002.

VOM said the two were lecturing on the differences between Christianity and Islam, and quoted directly from the Quran.

After his conviction, Nalliah had refused to apologize."