COMMENT | In 2006, prominent Muslim scholars from Germany, Egypt and the Middle East gathered in Cairo for a conference to discuss the issue of female circumcision or female genital mutilation (FGM).

Among the attendees were then Egyptian minister for religious charities, Mahmoud Hamdi Saksuk; the grand sheikh of Al-Azhar University Mohammed Sayyid Tantawi; Egyptian religious scholar and journalist Yusuf al-Qaradawi; Egyptian first lady's special ambassador and chairperson of the National Council for Childhood and Motherhood Mushira Chattab; and physician-in-chief of the women's clinic at the DRK Hospital in Berlin, Heribert Kentenich.

The conference, which was held at the Al-Azhar University under the patronage of Egyptian grand mufti Ali Gomaa, derived the following conclusion: "Female genital circumcision is a deplorable, inherited custom, which is practised in some societies and is copied by some Muslims in several countries.

"There are no written grounds for this custom in the Quran with regard to an authentic tradition of the Prophet."

The conference went on to call on legislative authorities to pass laws, which bans the practice of this "gruesome" custom and declared it a crime, irrespective of whether this concerns the perpetrator or the initiator.

Among Muslim-majority countries that have gone on to ban all forms of female circumcision are...