The Executive Committee of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), at the invitation of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, convened an extraordinary open-ended meeting in Jeddah on Sunday to condemn a recent burning and desecration of a copy of the Quran in Sweden.
The OIC member states also called on the OIC secretary-general to consider making an official visit to Stockholm and the European Union Commission in Brussels to express condemnation of the Quran burning.
Salwan Momika, 37, who fled from Iraq to Sweden several years ago, burned a copy of the Quran outside Stockholm’s main mosque after Swedish police granted a permit for the protest, which coincided with the start of the Muslim holiday Eid al-Adha.
The OIC] “[s]trongly condemns the recent despicable aggression against the sanctity of the Mushaf ash-Sharif in the Kingdom of Sweden, on the first day of Eid al-Adha, 1444, outside the central mosque in the capital city of Stockholm, deplores the recurrence of acts of desecration of the copies of the Mushaf ash-Sharif, and deeply Regrets the issuance by the authorities of a permit allowing that action to occur,” the final communiqué of the extraordinary meeting said.
According to the communiqué, the OIC General Secretariat and Malaysian authorities will convene an international conference on “Islamophobia and anti-Muslims Discrimination” on August 22-23, 2023 in Kuala Lumpur.
The burning of a copy of the Muslim holy book by Momika outside a Stockholm mosque with a permit from the police on Wednesday has caused outrage and condemnation in the Islamic world.
A Quran burning outside Turkey’s embassy in January also led to weeks of protests, calls for a boycott of Swedish goods and further stalled Sweden’s NATO membership bid.
