Czech far right party stages protest against Islam

Narodni StranaSupporters of the Czech far right National Party will stage a protest against Islamism outside the Brno mosque on Wednesday, the party has informed on its website.

The Libertas Independent Agency associating Brno Muslims and friends of Muslim nations has expressed its protest against the planned event in a statement CTK has obtained.

“We are naturally monitoring the situation and collecting all important information concerning it,” south Moravian police spokeswoman Jan Sipkova told CTK Monday.

The demonstration is to be a reaction to the death of Czech ambassador to Pakistan Ivo Zdarek who died on Saturday in the ruins of the Marriott Hotel in the Pakistani capital of Islamabad that became the target of a terrorist attack, along with another 52 people.

Shortly after Zdarek’s death, the Brno Muslims expressed condolence to his family. In the past, they always distanced themselves from Islamist terrorist attacks.

The Brno mosque which is the oldest Muslim house of worship in the Czech Republic marked ten years of its existence this summer. At the ceremony Muslims distributed one thousand roses among Brno residents as an expression of friendship and thanks for good co-existence.

The Brno Muslims condemned the attacks on New York on September 11, 2001. In the past, they considerably helped Czech diplomats in the salvation of public Czech Television (CT) reporter Michal Kubal and his colleagues after they were kidnapped in war-torn Iraq.

Prague Daily Monitor, 22 September 2008

Czech TV station fined for Islamophobia

Czech TV Nova was fined 100,000 korunas by the Council for Radio and Television for broadcasting xenophobic and Islamophobic content.

The station broadcast a report about Syrian Mohamed Fahed, who had killed his Czech common-law wife in Zelesice, near Brno. Fahed had said that where he came from, the Kurdish areas of Syria, a man was allowed to kill his wife. The reporter said that in Syria there’s Sharia law, which allows a husband to kill an unfaithful wife.

The Brno Muslim community complained to the Council, which decided that the report was xenophobic and Islamophobic, misleading regarding Islamic law. According to the council Syria is not run by Sharia law, and in any case Sharia law does not allow a husband to take justice into his own hands.

Nova denies the allegations and will go to court.

Islam in Europe, 29 August 2008

Most Czechs afraid of Islam

Some three-quarters of Czechs have a negative attitude to Islam, while 60 percent are afraid of it, according to a poll conducted by the polling agency STEM, published by the daily Hospodarske noviny (HN).

The fears may have been enhanced by the recent information that there was a threat of terrorist attack in the Czech Republic. Besides, the Czechs have poor knowledge about the religion. Some 11 percent are of the view that Buddha or Abraham respectively are the founders of Islam.

Some 55 percent agree with the view that there is a threat of a war of Western and Muslim civilisations. Almost one half of those polled are afraid of immediate terrorist attack in the Czech Republic.

However, Czech intelligence services do not consider Czech Muslims immediate security risk. “The Muslims who have been living here for a long time respect our laws and do not seek any clashes, confrontation or violence,” spokesman for the BIS counter-intelligence Jan Subert told the paper.

According to the poll, 29 percent of Czechs consider Islam a sect and three-quarters of them would like to ban the building of mosques here.

There are three of them in the Czech Republic, namely in Prague, Brno and Teplice, North Bohemia. However, in the latter, Muslims have only one leased storey in a house. Both in Brno and Teplice, local authorities had voiced reservations about the construction of a building with a minaret, the daily says.

Continue reading