Source: The Times Online
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article6985866.ece
Malaysian Sikhs have become the latest group to be dragged into a violent controversy about the use of the word Allah, with the stoning of Sikh temple following a series of arson attacks on Christian churches.
Vandals damaged a mirror, but caused no injuries, when they threw stones into the courtyard of the temple in the Malaysian capital Kuala Lumpur late last night. The attackers have not been identified, but they appear to be Muslims angry at the use by other religions of the word Allah as the Malaysian word for God.
The word has been used for centuries in Malaysia, as well as by Christians in Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and Indonesia, as the equivalent of the English word God. But many Malaysian Muslims, who make up 60 per cent of the population, say that Allah should be reserved exclusively for Muslims, and that use of it in a Biblical context encourages conversion to Christianity, a crime under the country’s sharia laws.