Saturday, the autodafé of a copy of the holy book by an anti-Islam activist in Stockholm had already aroused strong protests from Ankara.
Mo12345lemonde with AFP
The Netherlands Ambassador to Turkey was summoned on Tuesday, January 24, by the Minister of Turkish Affairs, after an Islamophobic activist uttered a copy of the Koran in The Hague, the Turkish ministry announced. “Our ministry has forcefully expressed our condemnation and our protest against this odious and ignoble act and demanded that the Netherlands do not allow such acts of provocation,” said the press release.
Sunday, a Dutch manager of the Islamophobic Pegida movement had been filmed tearing, near the lower room of the Dutch parliament, pages of a copy of the Koran, before trampling them. According to Dutch public television NOS, local police, however, prevented him from burning the holy book of Muslims.
Saturday, the autodafé of a Koran by another anti-Islam activist in Stockholm had already aroused strong protests from Ankara. On Monday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that Sweden, a candidate for joining the North Atlantic Treaty (NATO), could no longer count on Ankara’s “support” at the Continuation of this incident.
As part of a demonstration authorized by the police near the Turkey Embassy, the far-right politician Suédo-Danois Rasmus Paludan had burned a copy of the Koran, in an act to denounce the Negotiations between Sweden and Turkey concerning Sweden’s membership in the Atlantic Alliance.
Many other Muslim countries had expressed their indignation. Morocco expressed its astonishment that the Swedish authorities allowed this act “unacceptable” and “odious”, “which took place before the police”. Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates also condemned this gesture, as well as the Gulf Cooperation Council and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation. “Freedom of expression must be exercised in a responsible manner,” commented Djakarta.