Swedish Prime Minister meets with Muslim representatives

Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson met with representatives of the country’s Muslim community.

In a post shared on the Swedish Prime Minister’s Twitter account, Kristersson expressed his pleasure to meet with representatives of the Swedish Muslim community. Noting that these talks, which took place during the Swedish prime ministers’ tenure, are now being conducted by their own government, Kristersson said the representatives asked important questions, including recent events.

The meeting, which was also attended by Swedish Social Affairs Minister Jakob Forssmed, was attended by Tahir Akan, President of the Swedish Islamic Federation of the Swedish Muslim community, Mohamad Temsamani, President of the United Islamic Associations of Sweden, Mustafa Setkic, President of the Bosnian Islamic Society, Haider İbrahim, President of the Shiite Islamic Communities in Sweden, and the Islamic Academy. President Salahuddin Barakat attended.

The president of the Swedish Islamic Federation, Akan, said that such a meeting was organized on the initiative of Kristersson. Noting that recent anti-Islamic hate attacks in Sweden were discussed, Akan said: “We expressed the concerns of Muslims in Sweden. We stressed that Sweden is a tolerant state and noted that the recent image of the country has begun to be reversed in the international arena.

Akan said that Kristersson, who listened to the stories seriously and took notes, said that the dialogue with the Muslim community in Sweden is important and that he will do everything possible to improve it.

BURNING THE QUR’AN INCREASES THE TENSION

Rasmus Paludan, the leader of the Danish far-right Strict Direction Party, burned the Koran in front of the Stockholm Embassy in Sweden on January 21 in Stockholm, the capital of Sweden, and no one was allowed to approach Paludan during the protest held under the Crowded police protection.

Many Islamic countries, especially Turkey, reacted to the Swedish government’s permission to burn the Koran in Paludan.

Paludan burned the Koran in front of the mosque and in front of the Turkish Embassy in Copenhagen on January 27 in Denmark.

Edwin Wagensveld, the leader of the Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West (PEGIDA) movement in the Netherlands, tore up the Quran in a lone action in The Hague. Attacks on the Holy Quran are protested in Turkey and in many countries in Sweden, the Netherlands and Denmark. (AA)