Magic Statistics

After 15 years of bloodshed and chaos, Somalia appears to fallen under the control of an Islamic militia.  If, as many fear, the militia is allied with al Qaeda, jihadists may have found a safe haven and power base to replace Afghanistan.

An Islamic militia said today it has seized Somalia's capital after weeks of bloody fighting and 15 years of anarchy in this Horn of Africa nation, raising fears that the nation could fall under the sway of al Qaeda.

The militia appeared in control of Mogadishu. Most of the leaders of a secular alliance that opposed them — with cooperation from the United States — appeared to have fled the city by this afternoon.
. . .
U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter, said recently that three al Qaeda leaders indicted in the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania are being sheltered by Islamic leaders in Mogadishu.

The same al Qaeda cell is believed responsible for the 2002 suicide bombing of an Israeli-owned hotel in Kenya that killed 15 people and a simultaneous attempt to shoot down an Israeli airliner.

Many Somalis are willing to accept the establishment of Shariah law as a means of restoring a semblance of public order to the war-devastated country.  As Glenn Penner of The Voice of the Martyrs reminds us, however, that would be very bad news indeed for the tiny Christian minority.

Islamists have gone on record as saying that a Somali Christian is a dead Somali.  Christians are forced to worship in complete secrecy and reports of martyrdoms have leaked out intermittently over the past few years from this chaotic country.

Please pray for the oppressed and persecuted Somali Christians.  Please pray also for Voice of the Martyrs as it seeks ways to communicate with and support them.

A new report from Statistics Canada’s Centre for Justice Statistics pulls together existing data from police, corrections, and victimisation surveys to present analysis focusing on offending and victimisation among aboriginals.  Aboriginals are more likely than non-aboriginals to be victims of violent crime, but the statistics on offending indicate that aboriginals are also more likely to perpetrate violent crime.

About 4 in every 10 Aboriginal people aged 15 and over reported that they were victimized at least once in the 12 months prior to being interviewed.  This figure was not statistically different from results in 1999 when the last victimization survey was conducted.  However, the proportion is well above the level of 28% for non-Aboriginal people.

Aboriginal people were nearly twice as likely as their non-Aboriginal counterparts to be repeat victims of crime. They were also three and a half times more likely to be victims of spousal violence.

Overall, 21% of Aboriginal people, 24% of women and 18% of men, said they suffered violence from a current or previous spouse or common-law partner in the five-year period up to 2004. This compares to 6% of non-Aboriginal people. 

The above text is quoted from the summary notice in this morning’s Statistics Canada Daily.  Quotations and charts in the remainder of this post are from the full 31-page report, available here as a pdf document.

Despite being victimised by crime at a higher rate, aboriginals reported no greater fear of crime than do non-aboriginals.

Over half of violent crimes against aboriginals were committed by someone known to the victim, compared to 41% of those against non-aboriginals.  Aboriginals were victimized by a stranger in 25% of violent incidents; this was the case for 45% of violent incidents against non-aboriginal victims.  Related to this is the finding that 34% of aboriginal-victim violent crimes occurred in the victim’s home, compared to only 17% of violent incidents against non-aboriginal victims.

In about 4 of 10 violent incidents, aboriginal victims reported the crime to police—about the same proportion as non-aboriginal victims.

Aboriginals are much more likely than non-aboriginals to be victims of spousal violence by current or former partners.  This applies to both men and women.

Aboriginal people are far more likely than non-aboriginals to be a victim of, or accused of, homicide.  While aboriginals comprised approximately 3% of the Canadian population between 1997 and 2004, they made up 17% of homicide victims and 23% of those accused of committing homicide.  As a proportion of the respective overall population, there were 8.8 aboriginal homicide victims per 100,000, compared to 1.3 non-aboriginals per 100,000.  (This is shown in Figure 4, at left, found on page 7 of the full report.)  The homicide rate of male aboriginals was over double that of females.  Compared to non-aboriginals, aboriginal victims were more likely to be killed with a firearm, to have known their killer, to have consumed alcohol or other drugs, and to have initiated violence.

At the same time, aboriginals were accused of homicide at a rate of 11.2 per 100,000; non-aboriginals were accused of homicide at a rate of 1.1 per 100,000.  (See Figure 5, at right, from page 8 of the full report.)  Aboriginals represented 23% of those accused of homicide between 1997 and 2004.  Almost two-thirds of aboriginals accused of homicide were charged with second-degree murder, while non-aboriginals were charged with second-degree murder in less than half of their cases.

According to the Criminal Code, there are four separate homicide charges that can be laid by police: first-degree murder, second-degree murder, manslaughter and infanticide.  While Aboriginal people are proportionately more likely to be accused of homicide, they are less likely to be charged with the most serious type of homicide offence.

Between 1997 and 2004, for those homicides where a charge was laid or recommended against the accused, Aboriginal people were most likely to be charged with second-degree murder (66%) followed by first-degree murder (20%) and manslaughter (14%). These findings indicate that homicides involving Aboriginal accused are less likely to be planned and deliberate and more likely to be the result of an impulsive or emotional response.

By comparison, non-Aboriginal accused were most likely to be charged with the most serious offence, first-degree murder (46%), followed by second-degree murder (39%), manslaughter (14%), and infanticide (1%).

Aboriginals accused of homicide were more likely than non-aboriginals to have a previous criminal record.

In attempting to place these statistics in a broader social context, researchers referred to risk factors for criminal activity identified by criminologists and sociologists.  These include: being young, low education, unemployment, low income, high residential mobility, being a member of a lone-parent family, and living in crowded conditions.  These factors are all more prevalent among aboriginals than non-aboriginals.

Previous related post: Why are aboriginals over-represented in Canadian jails?

Abortion for reason of sex selection is quite common in some parts of the world, including China and India.  Rigourously enforced government policy permits Chinese parents only one child, and boys are considered more valuable because more likely to be able to support elderly parents, so there is an incentive to abort female children.  In India, advent of ultrasound technology, combined with a long-standing and widespread cultural preference for boy children, has resulted in a lopsided proportion of male births.

Since the popularization of ultrasound technology 20 years ago, allowing parents to know the gender of a fetus, the boy-girl ratio in that country has changed in the wake of mass termination of female fetuses — from 96 girls born for every 100 boys in 1981, to just 93 girls in 2001.

Based on these statistics, an estimated 500,000 extra girls are aborted annually in India.

Both China and India have begun encouraging birth of females: China pays cash bonuses for girls while India has made it illegal for doctors to reveal the sex of unborn children.

In some areas of Canada with large Asian immigrant populations, large disparities in the ratio of male births to female are now appearing.  The expected birth ratio is about 105 boys for every 100 girls.

In Coquitlam, B.C., where Chinese immigrants make up 12% of the population, for every 100 girls born in 2003, there were 112 boys. In 2001, it was 109, and in 2000, there was a startling 16% gap — 116 boys to 100 girls. In 1998, it was 115 boys.

It's the same story in Richmond, B.C. In the city of 164,345, roughly 64,270 people arrived via China or Hong Kong. There, it was 112 baby boys to every 100 girls in 2003. In 2000, the ratio was 111 to 100. In 1997, 114 to 100.

A similar pattern has emerged in other Canadian cities with large populations of Indian or Chinese immigrants.

That girls are being disproportionately aborted because parents prefer to have male children has been confirmed by abortion-clinic employees.  Although the vast majority of Canadians are uneasy with sex-selection abortions, Canada has absolutely no legal restrictions on the practice and therefore abortion is allowed for any reason.  Even if sex-selection abortion were illegal, it would be very difficult to enforce because a woman can have an ultrasound at one clinic and go to another for an abortion.

Even those who work at abortion clinics are divided as to the morality of sex-selection abortion.  The National Post article quotes one “staunchly pro-choice” counsellor who tries to dissuade women wanting to abort solely for reason of sex selection.  But according to an ”internal document” from Women’s Hospital, Vancouver, such procedures are not morally problematic.

"[N]ot allowing sex selection causes increased harm to women who must endure repeated pregnancies in efforts to have a son.

“Endure repeated pregnancies”?  Who would want to do a silly thing like that?

"[I]t is unclear if banning sex selection will benefit women."

Except for the women who would not be killed before birth.

via Nealenews.

A CBC Whitehorse radio reporter asked local Muslims for their reaction to last weekend's arrest of seventeen Canadian resident Muslims in southern Ontario on terrorism charges.  The man who spoke on tape for the local Muslim community, made up of seven families, says he is withholding judgment until more information is released.  From this morning's 6:30 am CBC Whitehorse radio news broadcast (not available online):

"We have to find out actually the people who are involved in those things. We have to see their background, who they are and whether they were captured on baseless or with some proof."

Nevertheless, he doubts whether those arrested are true followers of Islam.

"Islam itself when we talk about religion the name of this religion is peace and security. So how you describe the people who were arrested they have any relationship with the Islam?"

The Muslims in Whitehorse also say they have not been discriminated against because of the recent events.

The spokesman was named on the broadcast, but I have not repeated his name here because he sounds quite reasonable and I wouldn't want him to draw any unfavourable attention from jihadists.

The collect for today, Tuesday in Whitsun-Week, from the 1662 Book of Common Prayer:

God, who as at this time didst teach the hearts of thy faithful people, by the sending to them the light of thy Holy Spirit; Grant us by the same Spirit to have a right judgement in all things, and evermore to rejoice in his holy comfort; through the merits of Christ Jesus our Saviour, who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the same Spirit, one God, world without end. Amen.

For the Epistle: Acts 8:14-17
The Gospel: St John 10:1-10