Conflicts and clashes have always been a part of life at the international as well as the geographical level. It is also a fact that the wise people always do their best to settle differences through talks and negotiations. It is a daylight fact that even the worst conflicts and severest clashes could be resolved through table-talk and negotiation but the most important ingredient of all that process is the will to resolve the issues. Where there is a will, there is a way; it is an old saying.
Recently, in the last few weeks, two incidents of burning of the Holy Quran have been reported; one in Sweden and the other one in Denmark. Though it is unfair to hold the whole community responsible for the misdoings of an individual, these two incidents prompted widespread anger throughout the Muslim world and resultantly widened the breach between the Muslims and the rest of the world.
Thankfully, the reaction to the action of burning the Holy Quran was wisely pacified by those who desire to see this world conflict- and clash-free but such issues need no doubt a permanent solution. The most effective way of putting things in a peaceful order is to convince all stake-holders through table-talk and make them realize that this world of ours could no more afford sailing in self-created troubled waters.
In the first incident, Salwan Momika, a 37-year-old Iraqi refugee in Sweden was reported to be the person who burnt the pages of the Holy Quran in front of Stockholm’s largest mosque on June 28. It is something very unfortunate that before doing this criminal activity, Salwan was allegedly granted official permission to do so. Condemning Sweden’s decision of granting permission of burning the Holy Quran to an ‘extremist’, Iraq’s Foreign Ministry in an official statement said that such acts simply ‘inflame the feelings of Muslims around the world and represent a dangerous provocation’.
According to Swedish media reports, it was a well-planned incident and the target was to highlight Islamophobia; a term always rejected by the Muslim world. Salwan Momika is an Iraqi Christian who had fled to Sweden from Iraq several years ago, after being charged with multiple legal complaints, including deception. Earlier, Iraq has officially asked Sweden to repatriate him in order that he be prosecuted according to the Iraqi penal code. “In spite of a very sensitive criminal history, the Swedish Police had granted him a permit for the protest in line with free-speech protections in the country.” say media reports. According to the New Arab News, Momika was “an opportunist” seeking public fame, but had failed even to gain support from his Christian community in Iraq.
Every act of injustice, based on prejudice, partiality and discrimination leads to more cruelties, more atrocities. Be it Denmark, Sweden or the Illegally Indian Occupied Kashmir, for a long lasting peace and harmony, the only thing required is justice. If the world peace makers had listened to the voices of Kashmiri liberation leaders Syed Ali Shah Gilani, Burhan Wani and Ashraf Sehrai and that of Khalistan movement leader Amritpal Singh, the situation of world peace would never have been so horrible.
The Swedish Security Service is a very well organized, skilled and competent organization, it must be aware of Salwan Momika’s mysterious and secretive past. As pointed out in different,reports, he had remained attached with several militia organizations in the past. President of the Future Foundation, Washington DC, Entifadh Qanbar, blamed in a tweet that he had allegedly been a very active member of Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Force (PMF). Reports say that when he arrived in Sweden, Momika volunteered to work at a right-extremist Swedish party known for its hostility towards migrants, Muslims and Arabs. The main agenda of this party has been running a campaign to deport Arab migrants from the country.
In response to Momika’s loathsome act, all over the Muslim world, a very serious reaction was observed. Different Muslim organizations raised their voices against this atrocity and even the UN was asked to intervene in the matter for a justice-based solution to the issue.
According to the Aljazeera, the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) approved a resolution on religious hatred and bigotry in the wake of burning of the Holy Quran in Sweden that has led to protests across the Muslim world but the motion was opposed by the USA and the European Union. They said the motion conflicts with their positions on human rights and freedom of expression. The stance of the USA and the European Union on the issue in the United Nations Human Rights Council was seriously criticized, rather condemned, by the Muslims world.
Indonesia’s Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi said in a statement, “Stop abusing freedom of expression. Silence means complicity.” It is something very positive that some of the Non-Muslim activists also condemned the approach adopted by the USA and the European Union. Volker Turk, the UN human rights’ chief, said in his address to the UNHRC that inflammatory acts against Muslims, as well as other religions or minorities, are “offensive, irresponsible and wrong”. The government of Sweden also discouraged the incident but maintained that the country has a constitutionally-protected right to freedom of assembly, expression and demonstration.
It was simply the result of that ‘constitutional freedom of expression’ that another incident of the same nature was repeated in front of the Egyptian and Turkish embassies in Denmark’s capital Copenhagen in the last week of July 2023. According to media reports, this criminal act was performed by a far-right, ultra-nationalist group called ‘the Danish Patriots’. It is being apprehended that such type of hate-crimes would keep on being repeated time and again if the world powers don’t make sincere efforts to put an end to them.
Every act of injustice, based on prejudice, partiality and discrimination leads to more cruelties, more atrocities. Be it Denmark, Sweden or the Illegally Indian Occupied Kashmir, for a long lasting peace and harmony, the only thing required is justice. If the world peace makers had listened to the voices of Kashmiri liberation leaders Syed Ali Shah Gilani, Burhan Wani and Ashraf Sehrai and that of Khalistan movement leader Amritpal Singh, the situation of world peace would never have been so horrible.
