A Penang Syariah Appeal Court today upheld an unusual decision allowing a Chinese Malaysian to revert to her Buddhist faith, saying her conversion to Islam had never been valid.

Apostasy, or renouncing the faith, is one of the gravest sins in Islam and a highly sensitive issue in Malaysia where syariah courts have rarely allowed people to abandon the religion.

siti fatimah tan abdullah tan ean huang murtad apostacy case 070108 Siti Fatimah Tan Abdullah, a 39-year-old originally named Tan Ean Huang, said she had never practised Islamic teachings since she converted in 1998 and only did so to enable her to marry her Iranian husband.

The couple married in 2004 and she filed for renunciation after her husband left her, winning approval from a religious court last year in a decision appealed by the Islamic Religious Council in Penang.

Penang's Syariah Appeal Court today said Tan could revert to Buddhism, but only because her conversion was not valid and done only for the sake of marriage.

"She has been living a non-Islamic lifestyle and praying to deities and this clearly shows she never embraced Islam," said Ibrahim Lembut, one of a three-member panel of judges.

"The question of conversion does not arise because she never intended to become a Muslim in the first place."

Happy with the decision

Tan welcomed the decision.

"I am very happy that this is finally over. It has been a long struggle," she told reporters outside the court.

The Penang Islamic Religious Council also endorsed the ruling, which it said confirmed the status quo in Malaysia, where Syariah Courts operate parallel to civil courts.

"The original decision gave the impression that one could simply convert out of Islam. So now it is clear this is not the case," its lawyer Ahmad Munawar Abdul Aziz told reporters.

"In this case, the court has made it clear that this was a unique case where her conversion itself was invalid. So this removes the fear among the Muslim community that conversions may be subject to review."

- AFP