Denmark bans desecration of spiritual texts as tensions flare over Quran burnings

• Denmark’s parliament on Thursday handed a brand new regulation banning the desecration of all spiritual texts.
• The regulation comes as worldwide outrage over current public desecrations of the Quran triggered livid demonstrations in Muslim nations.
• “We must protect the security of Denmark and Danes,” a press release by Justice Minister Peter Hummelgaard stated. “That is why it is important that we now get better protection against the systematic desecrations we have seen for a long time.”

A brand new regulation was handed in Denmark’s parliament on Thursday that makes it unlawful to desecrate any holy textual content within the nation, after a current string of public desecrations of the Quran by a handful of anti-Islam activists sparked indignant demonstrations in Muslim countries.

The Scandinavian nation has been considered overseas as a spot that facilitates insults and denigration of the cultures, religions and traditions of different nations. The aim of the regulation was to counter “the systematic mockery” which, amongst different issues, has contributed to intensifying the specter of terrorism in Denmark, the justice ministry has stated.

“We must protect the security of Denmark and Danes,” Justice Minister Peter Hummelgaard stated in a press release. “That is why it is important that we now get better protection against the systematic desecrations we have seen for a long time.”

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The Folketing, or parliament, adopted the regulation in a 94-77 vote, with eight lawmakers absent. The brand new laws will make it against the law “to inappropriately treat, publicly or with the intention of dissemination in a wider circle, a writing with significant religious significance for a religious community or an object that appears as such.” Artistic endeavors the place “a minor part” features a desecration, however is an element of a bigger creative manufacturing, is not coated by the ban.

In the course of the greater than four-hour debate, left-leaning and far-right events united in opposition to the center-right authorities, repeatedly demanding that the three-party coalition that offered the draft on Aug. 25, participate within the dialogue. The federal government did not say something and had been known as “cowards” by the opposition.

“Does Iran change its legislation because Denmark feels offended by something an Iranian could do? Does Pakistan? Does Saudi Arabia? The answer is no,” Karina Lorentzen of the Socialist Individuals’s Occasion requested rhetorically. Inger Støjberg of the anti-immigration Denmark Democrats stated that the brand new regulation was a capitulation to Islam and a bowing right down to nations that “do not share (our) set of values.”

High Danish officers are photographed at Folketinget in Copenhagen, Denmark, Thursday Dec. 7, 2023. (Mads Claus Rasmussen/Ritzau Scanpix by way of AP)

“A restriction of freedom of expression is wrong in a modern and enlightened society like the Danish one,” Støjberg stated.

This 12 months alone, activists have staged greater than 500 protests, together with burnings of the Quran, in entrance of embassies of Muslim nations, locations of worship and in immigrant neighborhoods.

Denmark has repeatedly distanced itself from the desecrations, however has insisted that freedom of expression is without doubt one of the most essential values in Danish society. The federal government has stated there should “be room for religious criticism” and that there have been no plans to reintroduce a blasphemy clause that was repealed in 2017.

Oussama Elsaadi, an iman with a mosque in Denmark’s second-largest metropolis Aarhus, advised the B.T. newspaper that it is “a good message to all Muslims.”

“Burning of the Quran is an offense to others,” he stated, in keeping with B.T. “You may express yourself as you wish, but not in such a way that you destroy other people’s lives.”

In 2006, Denmark was on the heart of widespread anger within the Muslim world after a Danish newspaper posted 12 cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad, together with one sporting a bomb as a turban. Muslims contemplate photos of the prophet to be sacrilegious and inspiring of idolatry. The pictures escalated into violent anti-Denmark protests by Muslims worldwide.

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Those that violate the brand new regulation face fines or as much as two years in jail. Earlier than it takes impact, Denmark’s figurehead monarch Queen Margrethe must formally signal it. That’s anticipated to occur later this month.

In neighboring Sweden, which additionally has seen a string of Quran burnings and requests to stage protests involving the destruction of holy books, a government-appointed investigation will set up whether or not to assessment the police ordinance, the Swedish information company TT wrote.

Swedish police ought to have the ability to weigh threats to the nation’s safety through the examination of an software for a public meeting the place the desecration of a holy guide is included, and is ready to be accomplished by July 1 subsequent 12 months, TT stated.

There isn’t a regulation in Sweden particularly prohibiting the burning or desecration of the Quran or different spiritual texts. Like many Western nations, Sweden doesn’t have any blasphemy legal guidelines.

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The conflict of elementary rules has sophisticated Sweden’s need to affix NATO, an enlargement that gained urgency after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine however wants the approval of all present members. Turkey has blocked Swedish accession since final 12 months, citing causes together with anti-Turkish and anti-Islamic protests in Stockholm.