Violence
Second Swedish Mosque Targeted
in Suspected Arson Attack
BY LUCY WESTCOTT 12/29/14 AT 4:03 PM
A police officer takes a photo at the site
of a suspected arson at a mosque in the southern Swedish town of Eslov, Dec.
29, 2014. DRAGO
PRVULOVIC/TT NEWS AGENCY/REUTERS
A Swedish mosque was set alight on Monday,
in the second suspected arson attack on a mosque in the country in the last
four days.
No one was hurt in the attack, which
occurred in the southern Swedish town of Eslov early on Monday morning but
authorities have said they believe it was an arson attack. On Christmas Day,
five people were injured following a blaze at a mosque in Eskilstuna, a town
located west of Stockholm.
Two people remained in hospital on Friday
when several hundred people marched through Eskilstuna in protest of the
firebomb, which was thrown through a closed window into the building where 70
people were worshipping.
Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven
condemned the “hateful violence” and told Swedish SR radio: “We will never
tolerate this kind of crime. Those who want to practice their religion should
have the right to do so.”
Despite the perception
of Sweden’s liberal attitude towards immigration and asylum seekers, the
country is not immune to the rise of right-wing sentiment across many European
countries, with gains made by Hungary’s Jobbik
partyand Greece’s Golden Dawn party.
“There has been an intensification of
hatred against foreigners,” Omar Mustafa, the chief of Sweden’s Islamic
Association, told SR radio, Sweden’s public radio broadcaster, on Thursday.
Recent polls in Sweden have indicated a
rise in popularity of the anti-immigration Sweden Democrats, the country’s
third biggest party, which is poaching voters from the center left and center
right. The party received 12.9% of the vote in September elections.
Inspired by France’s National Front party,
the Sweden Democrats are part of the "new far Right," a group of
European political parties that have replaced a racist, skinhead image with
suits and respectability, and are “poised to have a deep effect on
Europe," The Telegraph reports.
Sweden Democrats want to cut the number of
asylum seekers by 90%. Sweden, which has a population of 9.5 million, received
nearly 80,000 applications for asylum in 2014, an enormous rise from the more
than 50,000 seen in 2013 and more than 40,000 in 2012. The majority of
applicants are from Syria, according to government data…
No comments:
Post a Comment