Yemen Islamists want Arab diva's concert cancelled

By Mohammed Mokhashaff

ADEN, Yemen (Reuters) - Yemeni Islamists have defaced billboards promoting an Arab diva and an Islamist lawmaker dubbed her planned concert as an "invitation for vice", raising concern among liberals in the conservative Arab country.

Asala, a renowned Syrian singer, often criticizes flashy female artists who rely more on their looks and steamy music videos than their talent, but that has failed to stem criticism.

"We have to play a significant role to stop the concert Asala will hold in Aden because it is a violation of sharia (Islamic law)," Islamist parliamentarian Fouad Dahaba said in a statement circulated through mobile telephone messages.

"Holding this concert ranks as an invitation for vice."

Dahaba's call was echoed by several prayer leaders in their Friday sermons who also criticized women's sports and some other art forms and activities they see as sacrilegious.

But several liberals in the Arabian Peninsula country, the ancestral homeland of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, said Dahaba's call showed a rising Islamist tide.

While concerts in Many Muslim countries are regular events, some more conservative societies -- mainly in the Arabian Peninsula -- reject public entertainment by women in line with Islamic teachings.

Yemen is ruled by a secular U.S.-allied government that joined Washington's "war on terror" after the September 11, 2001 attacks on U.S. cities, but society is conservative at heart.