#Religion: MARCH 2016

March 4. Ali Abdullahi, a 34-year-old migrant from Somalia who sexually assaulted a 15-year-old girl at a train station in Torquay, told the Exeter Crown Court that the crime was a misunderstanding caused by "cultural differences."

March 9. London is more "Islamic" than much of the Muslim world, according to Maulana Syed Ali Raza Rizvi, a prominent Shia cleric who was born in Pakistan. "I feel that London has more Islamic values than many of the Muslim countries put together," he said.

March 9. An eight-year-old girl was taken into protective custody after a man and a woman were arrested at Heathrow Airport in connection with alleged female genital mutilation offenses. The girl was believed to have been taken Somalia to carry out FGM overseas.

March 11. Staff at a nursery in Luton referred a four-year-old boy to a de-radicalization program after the child drew an image of a man with a large chopping knife. Teachers said they believed he was saying "cooker bomb" instead of "cucumber."

March 15. The Islamic Society at the London School of Economics held a gala dinner where men and women were segregated by a seven-foot screen so that attendees could not look at one another.

March 15. The Muslim Women's Council in Bradford announced plans to build Britain's first female-led mosque.

March 16. The High Court ruled that an 18-year-old girl who was born and raised in London and who ran away from home because her parents "were not strict enough Muslims" should be provided with government housing and a wide range of financial assistance until she turns 21.

March 17. A family court in London ruled that four children must be immunized after their Muslim mother refused consent because she said the vaccines contained pork gelatin.

March 20: A total of 3,955 people were referred to the Channel program, the British government's de-radicalization scheme, in 2015, nearly triple the figure (1,681) in 2014.

March 28. Teaching children fundamental British values is an act of "cultural supremacism," according to the National Union of Teachers (NUT), which wants to replace the concept with one that includes "international rights."

March 31. The Islamic Tarbiyah Academy, a private Muslim school in Yorkshire, was accused of promoting Islamic extremism. The founder of the school, Mufti Zubair Dudha, belongs to the orthodox Deobandi sect, which is thought to control half of all mosques and madrasas in the UK. Dudha has warned Muslims not to adopt British customs, and told them they should be prepared to "expend ... even life" to create a world organized "according to Allah's just order."