Muslim beauty contestant receives death threats

[Maimoona Ali]

Miss Universe candidate from England endures harsh criticism

Shanna Bukhari, an English-based fashion model is exciting with the possibility of winning the British contest for the Miss Universe pageant next month. If she winds, Bukhari will become the first Muslim to represent Britain at the international contest. But with the adulation comes a certain amount of danger - she receives catcalls and death threats from those who denounce her as "A dirty Muslim."



'I am not representing Islam and I am not the one that brought my religion into this,' Shanna Bukhari says. 'The minority out there should not use my religion to attack me.'



LOS ANGELES, - Bukhari says she has gotten hate mail from across the board. "I've had racists, I've had a minority from Muslim community, I've had it from all religions and all communities that dislike what I'm doing," she says. She has even received video links suggesting that she should be murdered.


Since then, she has made a point of never being alone, and a private security firm guards her when she appears at charity events.
"I am not representing Islam and I am not the one that brought my religion into this," Bukhari says. "The minority out there should not use my religion to attack me."

In deference to her religion, she will not be wearing a bikini in the competition. She says her swimsuit will be a one-piece topped with a sarong. "I don't think I would be comfortable wearing a bikini," she says.
"This competition does not define me as a person. It doesn't make me any less of a Muslim being in a pageant like this," she says. "Pageants like this are happening in Muslim countries as well.


"We live in a Western society and there is a minority out there who is trying to dictate and control others... they need to start accepting England as a whole and treat it as their country,: she says.
One of her most strident critics agrees with her on that point.
"As much as I may oppose the way a certain person dresses, I think it's important that people should have the right to dress the way they want to dress," said Mohammed Shafiq, the chief executive of the Ramadhan Foundation, an England-based Muslim youth organization working to build cross-community understanding.

But, although he says Shanna Bukhari may have a right to enter a beauty contest he says she should not.

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