September 28, 2012 - 15:11 AMT
Kyrgyz court bans gay Muslim documentary

A Kyrgyzstan court on Friday, Sept 28, banned screening of a documentary on gay Muslims, RIA Novosti reported.

“I’m Gay, I’m Muslim,” was submitted as part of the One World International Documentary Film Festival currently underway in the Kyrgyz capital of Bishkek. It reportedly tells the story of gay rights in the Islamic world through the lens of ordinary Moroccans.

Before the court ban, the Kyrgyz State Committee for National Security appealed to chief Mufti Rakhmatulla Egemberdiev, who believes the film “presents Islam in bad form using people, who have nothing to do with religion in general, as examples.”

This is the second recent ban on Islam-related film in Kyrgyzstan. A Bishkek court ruled the American anti-Islam film “Innocence of Muslims” extremist on September 21 and banned its screening.

Islam is the predominant religion in Kyrgyzstan, a landlocked country in Central Asia.