Protests across the Middle East against far-right Koran burning
Thousands joined protests in several predominantly Muslim countries on Friday to condemn the recent desecration of a copy of the Koran by far-right activists in Sweden and the Netherlands.
Demonstrations in Pakistan, Iraq and Lebanon ended with people dispersing peacefully. In Islamabad, the police stopped some crowds that tried to march towards the Swedish embassy.
In Beirut, around 200 angry protesters burned the flags of Sweden and the Netherlands outside the blue-domed Mohammed Al-Amin Mosque in Beirut’s central Martyr Square.
Earlier this month, a far-right activist from Denmark was given permission by the police to stage a protest outside the Turkish embassy in Stockholm where he burned the Koran, Islam’s holy book. Days later, Edwin Wagensveld, Dutch leader of the far-right Pegida movement in the Netherlands, tore pages out of a copy of the Koran near the Dutch parliament and stomped on the pages.
The measures outraged millions of Muslims around the world and sparked protests.
Swedish officials have stressed that freedom of speech is guaranteed by the Swedish constitution and gives people extensive rights to express their views publicly, although incitement to violence or hate speech is not allowed. Demonstrators must apply to the police for a permit for a public assembly. The police can refuse such permits only on exceptional grounds, such as risks to public safety.
Iraq’s powerful Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr asked in comments released Friday whether freedom of speech means violating other people’s beliefs. He asked why “the burning of the gay rainbow flag does not represent free speech.”
The cleric added that burning the Koran “will bring divine wrath.” Hundreds of his followers gathered outside a mosque in Baghdad, waving copies of the Koran.