British Muslims in push to release teacher in Sudan

By Opheera McDoom

KHARTOUM (Reuters) - Two leading British Muslims meet with Sudan's president on Monday in an attempt to secure the early release of a British teacher jailed for allowing her students to name a teddy bear Mohammad.

Gillian Gibbons was sentenced on Thursday to 15 days in jail for insulting Islam to be followed by deportation.

Britain's ambassador to Sudan, Rosalind Marsden, said she was optimistic the meeting with President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, expected to take place at 10:30 a.m. (7:30 a.m. British time), could lead to the early release of Gibbons.

"We very much hope that following the meeting with the president tomorrow morning the decision will be taken to release Mrs. Gibbons as soon as possible," Marsden told reporters late on Sunday night.

"I'm not 100 percent confident but I'm certainly more optimistic than I was now that we know that the peers have been given the opportunity of a meeting with President Bashir tomorrow," she said.

Marsden said the private initiative by Lord Ahmed and Baroness Sayeeda Warsi offered the best hope for Gibbons' early release. The peers delayed their departure after Bashir confirmed a last-minute meeting following a two-day wait.

Gibbons let her pupils at Khartoum's private Unity High School pick their favourite name for a teddy bear as part of a project on animals in September. Twenty out of 23 of them chose Mohammad -- a popular boy's name in Sudan, as well as the name of Islam's Prophet.

uk.reuters.com