Tariq Ramadan, professor of contemporary Islamic studies at Oxford, was invited for an interview at Europe to discuss the situation of Islam in France. “As Western Muslims, we have a moral obligation,” said Ramadan, speaking about the tragic situation of Christians in the East and in Africa. “We must condemn all that pertains to discrimination and terrorism, such what is occurring in Muslim-majority societies,” he said. “As Western Muslims, we have a moral obligation. We must denounce what states are doing, the multifaceted treatment…more and more of which is terror, as we just witnessed in Kenya,” he stated.
Ramadan also responded to Dalil Boubakeur’s announcement, which called for doubling the number of mosques in France. “There should be as many mosques as needed. We know that if we want to eliminate prayers in the street, we must open other spaces,” he stated. In order for a “French Islam” to be possible, Ramadan stressed the question of funding: “There is a very important aspect: funding, for religious authorities, for the training of imams, all of that must be done in France.” He was particularly against accepting funds from “non-democratic states, who preach a backwards and fundamentalist Islam.”
Ramadan attended to the annual UOIF gathering in Bourget, which addressed the question of representing French Muslims: “There can only be representation of an Islam of France with a process that comes from the ground,” he affirmed, before warning: “The French government should not…choose someone whose discourse they agree with but who represents no one,” instead insisting on the “plurality of voices” of French Muslims.
