Many Dutch Decision-Makers Wondering Whether Reactions, Particularly Criticism Of Muslims, Did Not Go Too Far. By Isabelle Wesselingh Reeling from the slaying of a controversial filmmaker by a suspected Islamic extremist and a resulting backlash against Muslim institutions, the traditionally tolerant Dutch are mulling the limits of freedom of expression. “It is important today that…
MARSEILLE, France (AFP) – In a major broadside, President Jacques Chirac and Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin rejected a senior government minister’s idea of using state funds to build mosques and train Islamic religious leaders. Chirac obliquely accused his arch rival – Finance Minister Nicolas Sarkozy is expected to seek his job in the 2007 presidential…
Ian Traynor in UDEN, the Netherlands Kneeling in the sodden, charred remains of the primary school, Hari Boukameans took a Stanley knife to a melted computer. He twisted and he gouged – trying to recover the hard drive, hoping to salvage a little bit of the precious Dutch culture of live and let live from…
The Islamic Community of Spain (CIE) rejected that Islam be taught in schools “with an exposition similar to the classes of catholicism.” According to the accepted leader of the Muslim community, Malik Ruiz, “the most appropriate system is not to give lectures of one or two hours of Islamic religion each week, since it is…
The chief of the main directorate of Religious Subjects, Mercedes Rico-Godoy, on a visit to Melilla, has spoken of the city as a “laboratory” that can be taken as a reference for the beginning of classes in Islam in the rest of Spain, an objective of the Government for 2005.
