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Planned "Hindu Vatican" causes furor in Moscow,Both orthodox christians and jewish leaders are in a campaign to halt Alfred Fords funding of a huge Krishna temple in moscow, this has caused a rift between the government and it's overtures to Indian Prime minister Vajpayee who is a big supporter of the planned temple and the new religious right in russia, for full story
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Muslim Leaders Call For Ban On Krishna Food Programs


Interfax (Russian Federation), Mar. 30, 2004
http://www.interfax.ru



MOSCOW. March 30 (Interfax) - The spiritual leaders of the Northern Caucasus have expressed their displeasure over the participation of Krishnas in charity programs in places where Muslims live in compact communities.

"The coordination center of the Muslims of the Northern Caucasus is expressing its outrage with the actions of the Society for Krishna Consciousness, which conducted active proselytism in Chechnya in the mid 1990s taking advantage of the difficult situation for the Muslims living there," reads a statement issued by the center which was obtained by Interfax on Tuesday.

Maxim Osipov, press secretary for the Society for Krishna Consciousness, recently admitted that "Muslims in Grozny have been given food devoted to the pagan deity Krishna as humanitarian aid."

"The Krishnas knew that the sharia law does not allow Muslims to eat food intended as offering to other idols," the statement reads.

The spiritual leaders of the Northern Caucasus said that "the activities of the destructive sect Society for Krishna Consciousness is a serious challenge to the religious world."

"We are calling on the law enforcement agencies to investigate this incident and to prevent the Krishnas from participating in charity programs in places where Muslims live in the future," the document reads.

In the meantime, Nafigulla Ashirov, the chief mufti of the Asian part of Russia, disagreed. "In the Northern Caucasus, there are so many needy and hungry people right now that it doesn't matter to them what food they eat. If the Krishnas were giving people living in the Caucasian republics free food, they were doing a good thing," he said.

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During the war in chechnya krishna followers were seen as "angels" by the populace for being there to feed them, the same phenomena happened in bosnia during the war there.

for more on the free food programs in war torn societies by the Krishna's

Vegetarian Times : Hare Krishna's feed the world