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MOSQUES

France shuts four ‘extremist’ mosques in Paris region

France’s Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve announced on Wednesday that France had taken action to close down four mosques suspected of promoting a violent form of Islam.

Published: 3 November 2016 08:53 CET
France shuts four 'extremist' mosques in Paris region
Photo: AFP

The mosques were all in the Ile-de-France region around Paris – in the departments of Yvelines, Seine-Saint-Denis and Val de Marne.

In a statement the interior minister Bernard Cazeneuve said authorities had “arranged the administrative closure of four mosques.”

The decision to shut them down was based on “Article 8 of the laws around the state of emergency which allows for closing places of worship in which words are spoken that provoke hatred or violence or incite people to commit acts of terrorism or justify such acts.”

The closures take effect immediately.

One of the mosques was the Al-Islah mosque in Villiers-sur-Marne where authorities discovered a hidden Islamic school in the summer.

It was known to intelligence services because it was frequented by 12 individuals convicted of trying to travel to Syria to wage jihad.

One of the closures was an Islamic prayer room in the town of Ecquevilly in Yvelines that was “an influential place for the Salafist movement… that called for discrimination and hate and even violence.”

After the spate of terror attacks over the last year the French government has been under pressure to crack down on radical Islam, particularly in mosques.

On October 12th the interior minister announced that 20 mosques and radicalized prayer rooms had been closed since France declared a state of emergency on the night of the November 13th terror attacks last year.

 

 

MUSLIM

Italy’s top court rejects Lombardy’s ‘anti-mosque’ bid

A bid by the Lombardy region to limit the construction of new mosques has been rejected by Italy’s top court.

Published: 24 February 2016 12:28 CET
Italy's top court rejects Lombardy's 'anti-mosque' bid
Italy's Constitutional Court overturned a regulation by the Lombardy region which would have prevented the construction of new mosques. Photo: Alberto Pizzoli/AFP

The region’s right-wing leadership approved regulations, which became known as “anti-mosque” laws, in January 2015, but Prime Minister Matteo Renzi later referred the new rules to the Constitutional Court for review.

Roberto Maroni, the Northern League president of the Lombardy region, took to Twitter on Wednesday to announce the court’s decision, adding that left-wing politicians were hailing it “Allah”.

“The court has rejected our law regulating the construction of new mosques,” Maroni wrote. “The left celebrates: Allah Akbar.”

The region had sought to subject anyone wanting to build a mosque, or other place of worship for a faith not officially recognized by the state, to an exhaustive list of restrictions, effectively preventing any new construction.

Islam is the only major religion that does not have official status in Italy, despite the country being home to an estimated one million Muslims.

The court ruling falls in line with a government bid to better integrate the Muslim community and follows the announcement in January that a special council, made up of academics and experts in Islamic culture and religion, would be tasked with the job.